


I Fought the Lore and the Lore Won

by shihadchick



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: M/M, Not Hockey Players (Hockey RPF), Unsolved AU, and just a soupcon of monster-fucking, plenty of sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-23
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-13 15:20:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29653305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shihadchick/pseuds/shihadchick
Summary: Moose Jaw wasn't as much of a backwater as the rest of Canada might like to think, but as for the guy who walked in when Ryan was a beer and a half deep and starting to consider going over to the jukebox to see if they had any decent country yet—Ryan didn't need much more than instinct to know he was from out of town.
Relationships: Boone Jenner/Ryan Murray
Comments: 8
Kudos: 39





	I Fought the Lore and the Lore Won

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to _voidfish for betaing this behemoth and wrangling my em-dashes. <3 
> 
> ETA: formatting error near the end fixed, oops, this is what I get for posting at 1am.
> 
> Please take good care of our favourite cryptid boy, New Jersey; we miss him a whole bunch over in CBJ land. <3

* * *

Ryan hadn't been into town for a while.

He got by just fine most of the time with his own company; living on the very edge of the city, buying in bulk, storing what he could, foraging and hunting for more, and there was always the internet and a handy credit card for everything that didn't cover. But occasionally he'd give in to the need to spend some time around people who'd talk back, or probably would if he actually spoke to them.

The potential was enough, most of the time. He could pretend Jake was about the only company he needed, but he'd be lying to himself if he did.

If he got too lonely, he could always head over to Regina to catch up with his folks, but usually he was fine after a little time around people, even if it was only to remind himself why he didn't spend all that much time inside city limits these days.

Besides, it wasn't like he didn’t have buddies living nearby to hang out with even now, they were just… not around as much these days. They were all married, or working long hours, or sometimes both, and no one had time to hang out much unless it was the weekend anyway, so sometimes Ryan would just stop in at a bar and grab a beer or three, let himself pretend like he had more than half that equation covered.

Moose Jaw wasn't as much of a backwater as the rest of Canada might like to think, but as for the guy who walked in when Ryan was a beer and a half deep and starting to consider going over to the jukebox to see if they had any decent country yet—

Ryan didn't need much more than instinct to know he was from out of town.

Out of the whole damn province, probably; Ryan could usually pick those a mile away.

Usually steered even clearer of them. The people around home, they were used to him, at least. Strangers were always something of an unknown quantity.

But it'd been a long time since Ryan met someone he liked immediately, instinctively, the way he was drawn to this guy. And the guy was—looking right back, Ryan realized.

He swallowed the last of his beer hurriedly and set the glass down, feeling a kind of inevitability as the guy paused for a split-second and then walked right over to take the bar stool next to his, sitting down and ordering a wheat beer, his voice as warm and friendly as his smile.

"Boone," the guy said, holding his hand out to Ryan and flashing him a grin with crooked teeth and full lips, hazel eyes holding his in a frank appraisal. Ryan was pretty sure he could see hints of at least a couple years of hockey there; a missing tooth that'd been replaced by a bridge and a nose that'd been broken at least twice. Then again, maybe he just had brothers. Not like Ryan didn't know what that was like.

And Ryan was staring, and not actually saying anything, shit.

"Hi," Ryan said, words tumbling out at speed. "I'm Ryan. Murray."

"Nice to meet you, Ryan Murray," Boone said, giving him a slow but unmistakable look up and down. Ryan shifted his weight and reminded himself to at least try and act normal. "Having a good night?"

"It's going okay," Ryan said, which was not his smoothest move ever, but it wasn't as if he got a whole lot of practice flirting with cute guys who he hadn't known since he was ten years old. "What brings you out here?"

Boone gave him what could only be described as a smirk. "How do you know I don't live here?"

Ryan snorted.

"I've got a good ear, you're from out East somewhere. And while you do get points for work boots that've actually been used, I don't think you're farming lentils or peas or whatever." Boone had the muscle for it, Ryan could see _that_ even through the loose plaid shirt he was wearing, the collar unbuttoned and not ironed any time recently, but he was also winter pale in the height of summer, and even the most cautious farmer picked up something of a tan when they were outdoors all day, every day.

"Good guess," Boone said, his gaze sharpening, and Ryan felt a shiver run through him that had absolutely nothing to do with any of his more otherworldly senses. "I'm just visiting, getting a feel for the place."

"Oh, did you do the tunnels tour yet?" Ryan asked, like he was being paid by Tourism Saskatchewan, jeez. Maybe he had been living here too long after all.

A look Ryan couldn't parse flashed across Boone's face as he nodded, but it smoothed away almost instantly as he laughed and said, "Actually, yeah. That was last night’s job. I'm just looking to relax tonight, though. No plans."

Ryan hadn't picked up in a while, but even he could translate that one, and if he'd been second-guessing himself, the way that Boone casually reached over and rested his hand on Ryan's forearm was enough of a confirmation that this was exactly what he thought it was.

What he hoped it was, he had to admit. And—why the fuck not, he thought to himself, as Boone finished his beer in a hurry and said, "So, you wanna get out of here, then?"

Ryan was interested, Boone was hot, nothing wrong with a one night stand. No strings attached was exactly Ryan's speed, and if he was only in town for a night or two then there wasn't time for it to get complicated or awkward.

Win-win, really.

* * *

Ryan rolled over and looked up at the hotel room ceiling, unable to wipe the grin off of his face.

The covers were all bunched up at the end of the bed, the summer air barely moving even with the ceiling fan running lazily and the window open to catch whatever breezes there were. Fresh sweat had gathered along his hairline, at the back of his knees, and it was sticking his back to the sheets as he tried to catch his breath, Boone a solid line of heat along his side, like neither of them could bear to stop touching again so soon.

"Well that was definitely better than sinking a couple craft beers and coming back here for an early night," Boone said, stretching out with his arms over his head, his knuckles brushing along the smooth fabric of the headboard.

Ryan shamelessly enjoyed watching as he arched his back, rolled his neck to stretch out his traps and sprawled over Ryan's side of the mattress like he owned the place, dick soft against his stomach, and both of them looking markedly the worse for wear.

"Yeah, I didn't mind it either," Ryan joked, and flushed hot pink as Boone licked his lips pointedly and ran his gaze right back down Ryan's body again. Boone had spent a gratifyingly long amount of time sucking Ryan off, mouth hot and relentlessly focused, taking him apart and almost back to the edge again before he'd let Ryan even try to return the favor.

By then, they'd both been too tightly wound and frantic for Ryan to do more than curl his fingers around Boone before he'd bucked up and shot all over his hand. It'd been fast and fun, slightly awkward but definitely hot sex, and Ryan had no regrets at all. He felt more relaxed and at home in this skin than he had done in weeks.

Score one for casual hook-ups, Ryan thought, turning his head on the pillow to grin at Boone, at the wild mess of his hair flopping over his forehead and into his eyes, making him blink hard before returning Ryan's grin.

Ryan kind of wanted to play with his hair, but he wasn't sure on the etiquette of that one when it was just a casual hook up, so instead he just rolled onto his side to look at Boone properly, running his palm over his hip and in, the heel of his hand bumping over each rib, brushing over his pecs before sweeping back down again. He could feel Boone's heart beating steadily under his hands, could hear the regular thump of it without even extending his senses.

He hadn't hit it off with someone so spectacularly in a long time, and it was hard to hold onto the original plan of making this a one-and-done when it’d been so good. Ryan sure wouldn’t mind doing it again.

And thinking about round two led him right into wondering if he should ask whether Boone wanted him to stay over.

"You asking if I wanna go again tomorrow night?" Boone said easily, when Ryan asked how long he was in town for anyway.

"Uh, yeah," Ryan said.

He was expecting something obvious and easy; a tourist passing through on the TransCanada, someone in town for a conference, maybe for high tech farming gear or accounting or something, whatever, Ryan doesn't know, but there weren't a whole lot of reasons to come to Moose Jaw from Ontario if you didn't have family there already.

"Ha, well, actually," Boone said, lightly, like it was no big deal, "I kind of have this—I do a YouTube channel?"

"Oh?" Ryan said.

His mama raised him polite, and besides, Ryan knew how the internet worked these days, and it seemed like anyone who could make a good impression or go viral could run their own thing. Ryan could understand the urge to be your own boss, that was for sure.

"Yeah, I investigate shit." Boone shrugged, looked self-deprecating, like he was used to having to defend this, his shoulders set like he was waiting for Ryan to laugh at him and he was ready to laugh along with him. "We did a shoot down in the tunnels yesterday and talked about some of that history, but the real reason I wanted to come out this way is I kept seeing stuff about, like, some kind of Bigfoot creature that wanders around here. So we’re here to see what we can find out."

Ryan did not laugh.

Boone looked at him, squinted for a moment, his broad friendly features drawing into a frown until he shook it off and added, with a rueful little grin and look up through his lashes that Ryan was suddenly certain had gotten him into the bedrooms of more than one small town girl or guy over the years, "It's not as weird as it sounds, I promise."

Ryan's instincts to hide—to immediately act to protect himself—were as strong as ever, and there was no thick brush to melt away into there, no pattern of light and dark to mimic with his hair and his clothing and his skin; the only things he had to disguise himself with were ubiquity and calm. Not reacting was going to be the most sensible thing he could do.

He forced a laugh and said as lightly as he could, "I bet that's a trip. Takes all kinds, huh?" before running a finger up and over Boone's sternum, leaving goosebumps in his wake. "You got enough energy there for another go, monster hunter?"

Ryan tried to copy Boone's little flirty sheepish look, and realized he'd maybe done that a little too well when he felt his eyes start to change. _Fuck_.

Ryan let his eyes half-close, lashes sweeping down towards his cheeks as he leaned in and kissed Boone again, sinking into it, only relaxing at last when Boone's eyes closed as well, when his arms came up and wrapped around Ryan, encouraging him to take more and more.

He was fine, he was safe, he was sure Boone hadn't noticed anything he shouldn't have, and then Boone opened his mouth to Ryan and ran a hand down to cup his ass, squeezing gently, and Ryan let arousal flood through him, let himself actually enjoy all of this instead of hiding away with it, and for a few minutes he forgot to be afraid that Boone would find out he'd already gotten his hands on the creature he was hunting for.

He rolled on top and let gravity push him down onto Boone, his thigh pushing between Boone's, and Boone made a broken little noise and arched up against him.

"That's it," Ryan said, letting satisfaction shiver through his voice, dropping low and almost to a growl. Boone was definitely not going to notice that, not with Ryan's hand pushing between them again, his palm sliding familiarly over the length of his dick.

"Prairie air's good for me, I guess," Boone gasped, laughing a little, his hips pushing up into Ryan's hand. "Didn't see this coming at all."

"I'm gonna see you coming," Ryan promised him, leaning into the cheesy line, letting himself talk without overthinking it as he started to kiss his way down Boone's body, mouthing over the line of his collarbone to the swell of muscle at his biceps, noting the swirl of ink wrapping around his triceps in passing.

Telling himself not to panic noticeably. That it was all going to be fine.

Ryan blinked sweat out of his eyes and rested his other hand on Boone's hip, trying to get his control back, feeling almost dizzy with how much he wanted Boone, with the wildly disorienting emotional swing from fear of discovery to overwhelming arousal.

He hadn't felt like this in so long, and he wanted to gorge himself, to roll around in it and hug Boone greedily to himself as long as he could, but that would definitely set off alarm bells, even if they were only the normal human 'watch out for that freak' types of ones, so he told himself to keep together for fuckssake, and keep moving down Boone's chest. There was enough hair spread across it to satisfy his baser instincts, not that Ryan of all people was gonna be throwing stones in that particular greenhouse, and it prickled over his lips, thickened in the center of Boone’s chest, arrowing down to his belly button.

Ryan licked over one flat nipple in passing and grinned to himself as Boone jerked under him at the rasp of his tongue, a little more sensitive than he'd been expecting. Ryan was going to remember that for later, too.

He rubbed his nose into Boone's navel and then shifted his weight again, one hand still on Boone's dick, holding it steady. Ryan licked his lips—Boone made another hoarse noise, and apparently his eyes were open again but that was fine, he wouldn't see anything Ryan didn't want him to.

"Fuck, you're good at that," Boone said, his voice low, and Ryan liked how it made him feel, liked the warmth of it, the smoky rough implications, the flirty tone he couldn't seem to turn off even when he’d clearly already succeeded at talking Ryan into bed.

Ryan had thought it was a bit at first, just a move to sweet-talk his way inside the jeans of whatever bored small town girl—or guy, apparently—that he wanted, but he'd been just as smooth with the bartender on their way out of the bar, and he had been an older white guy with more hair in his ears than on his head, who Ryan was pretty sure had been pulling beers there for at least the last fifty years. Maybe even longer. Boone just seemed to be good with people. Ryan was… a little jealous, actually.

"Good at a lotta things," Ryan replied with a grin, flashing just the tiniest glimpse of his teeth. And then he covered them with his lips and took Boone's dick into his mouth, his tongue curling around the head, tugging a heartfelt cry out of Boone that shivered along Ryan's nerves and set him alight all over again.

"Fuck yeah," Boone said, which was about what Ryan had been expecting, and then, "You should tell me about those other things, too," which he hadn't.

Ryan sucked hard, feeling Boone’s dick start to harden again in response before he pulled off for a second, looking back up at Boone to meet his eyes. People seemed to like that a lot. And it couldn't hurt to kill time while he thought about other hot, dirty things he could say to Boone, since apparently that was his thing. "I've been told I eat ass like a champ too?" he offered, and Boone's dick jerked against his hand as he groaned.

"Fuck," Boone said, and then, a little too calmly for a dude whose dick had just been in Ryan's mouth and was about two seconds away from a return visit. "I meant, like, other stuff though. What d'you do for fun around here, Ryan?"

Ryan hesitated for a second, thinking frantically, and hoped Boone hadn't noticed. "Uh, I like, uh, fishing? Some hunting? You know, the usual."

"Outdoorsy, that's cool," Boone said, nodding, and his fingertips ran over Ryan's cheek, down to his jaw, scratching over the stubble that was already developing. His hair just grew so fast, and that was another reason to be careful with Boone, to make sure he didn't notice. To make sure he didn't guess just exactly why he should notice.

Boone tugged him closer, encouraged him to slide back up till their faces were on a level. "You should come with us."

"Huh?" Ryan said, blinking, trying to push away the lazy go-along-with-it urges that kept trying to creep over him, the more Boone touched him. Ryan wasn't supposed to be _this_ easy with anyone.

Boone grinned, ran his other hand down Ryan's back and groped his ass some more shamelessly. "You should hike with me, see what we can see." His nails dragged over Ryan's skin and Ryan shuddered and pushed against his touch, helpless with wanting him. "Maybe camp out with me."

"I, uh—" shouldn't, Ryan should say. Can't would be less suspicious. But apparently Boone had some kind of a spell over him because the words that tumbled out were uncertain; a "Maybe?" that was less convincing than it should’ve been.

Then again, if Ryan was _with_ Boone, and his family didn't come visit unexpectedly—and he was going to call them the second he left Boone's hotel room to make damn sure no one else was going to be in the area—then Ryan was absolutely guaranteed that Boone wasn't going to find anything he shouldn't. And Ryan could guide him clear of anyone else who might've seen something too.

It was a perfect plan, and Ryan should absolutely follow it for his own safety and well-being.

Boone reached for him and kissed him, open-mouthed, hot and greedy, not the least put off by where Ryan’s mouth had just been, and Ryan melted into him.

Okay, so there might be some other benefits as well.

* * *

Thinking it through in the cold light of day, Ryan wasn't all that sure how the whole hiking together thing was going to work with Boone's 'show'.

He'd begged off staying the night in Boone's hotel room with an excuse about making sure his dog was okay—which was true enough, even if Jake was smart enough to take care of himself for a couple hours—and he'd done some research then, hunched over his laptop past midnight and cursing every time the wifi cut out, watching his way through a couple episodes of _Unexplained: From Phantoms to Frogmen_. Okay, the better part of the most recently released season.

And the worst part was: he didn't like Boone any less after watching.

He was clever, quick, charismatic with the camera on him, and constantly joking back and forth with his camera guy, the two of them clearly comfortable with each other after a long—Ryan scrolled back and could see a solid four years worth of videos—association.

Boone was funny, and charming when he spoke to the locals—well, Ryan could've vouched for that part by himself—but he didn't pressure when people were obviously uncomfortable or scared. And he got so endearingly excited every time he thought he'd found something cryptid related, even though Ryan could tell just from the low resolution cell phone video Boone was calling ‘evidence’ that at least three of those so-called cryptid traces were bear scat, and the other one was something that long experience made him suspect was 'local teenagers fucking with the dude who rolled into town a day ago', a classic of the genre all by itself.

Ryan smiled fondly; the teens in small towns were excellent both at providing additional alibis and at throwing people off the scent any time a stranger saw something they shouldn't have.

He was pretty sure at least some of the settler families that had been in rural Saskatchewan for years did it on purpose, the ones who knew a little more than the others, who respected the old ways and figured that if it weren't broke—and it wasn't eating their stock—then it didn't need fixing.

Keeping up their responsibilities in looking out for the people who’d welcomed them as distant cousins was something that Ryan had grown up with, too, an agreement that was only recorded in the oral histories of the Ojibwe, but one that Ryan had been raised to respect.

Ryan's dropped a few deer off on the porches of the old-timers over winter, helped take a few down to the community center when they asked as well; they had the customs and traditions and responsibilities that had come over the ocean with them, and the ones that’d been built up since they got here.

His family might've only come over from Scotland a few centuries back, but they'd made friends who knew the land, and who they knew they could trust with their secrets.

But the worst part of doing all this feverish research—or maybe it was better, Ryan truly couldn't tell anymore—was that Ryan was even more certain, after seeing even the slickly produced and tightly edited show, complete with background research and running jokes and found footage… There was no question about it, he was going to need to keep an eye on him for as long as Boone was in town.

So if Ryan was getting laid, and Boone was only getting the type of action that Ryan was quite comfortable sharing with a limited audience of people around them—and absolutely no one was going to see anything supernatural whatsoever, then that was going to be a win for Ryan on every level.

He tried to ignore the tiny voice at the back of his mind that was suggesting this decision was being driven a lot more by his dick than anything else.

It was all going to be just fine.

* * *

Turning over page after page of the paperwork that Boone had dropped onto the scarred wooden table on Ryan's porch with a shit-eating grin, Ryan let himself start entertaining second thoughts.

That was—a lot of legalese. The indemnity clause he'd pretty much expected—Boone was Canadian but his media company were American, and there was no way they'd want some random out in the field with their team unless he was willing to agree not to sue them for—"Wait, I'm waiving my right to sue if we get abducted by _aliens_?"

"Don't ask why that's in there," Boone said solemnly, his thigh pressed warm against Ryan's, and a wicked grin on his face.

Ryan looked at him, and then over at the guy Boone had introduced as 'Jonesy', a tall Black guy with intense eyes and a soft voice, who was doing his best to try and loom over Ryan, but kept undercutting any actual menace he could've projected with how fondly he grinned in Boone's direction any time Boone cracked a joke.

Ryan had looked between the two of them for a long minute when their rented SUV had bounced its way down the long unsealed driveway, wondering what he was getting himself into. Or in between, maybe, given the way that Boone's hand lingered on Jonesy's shoulder, thumb rubbing over the back of his neck while he introduced them to each other.

He'd wondered if maybe Boone was just that touchy with everyone, let alone people he was trying to sweet-talk into bed, but the soft look on Jonesy's face—or Seth, as he finally introduced himself, with an eye-roll at Boone's love of nicknames—made him think that maybe he was onto something there. And the way his expression didn’t change even as Boone leaned into Ryan and argued that they'd have so much more fun, and be a lot safer with a local guide just reinforced that impression.

Then again, they'd be leaving town soon and could figure out their own problems later. Ryan wasn't going to worry about that part, so long as he could make sure the next couple of days went smoothly. There was nothing in the woods that would scare him, and if he couldn't read the weather by this point in his life then his dad would have something to say about it.

Ryan was quietly confident that they'd hike around and see not much of anything in particular, or maybe at most a moose—at a distance, if they were lucky; because when Ryan said he wasn't scared of anything it was only because he wasn't dumb enough to try and see a moose up close. They'd smell him coming, at least, no matter what shape he looked like to human eyes, so as long as Ryan could keep these two tourists safe and healthy it'd all be just fine.

He didn't mind a little babysitting sometimes.

And, as Boone’s thumb slid towards his inseam and dug in suggestively, Ryan squirmed and added to himself: and he definitely didn't mind fucking around outdoors, either. Looked like Boone was on his level about that, too. And if Boone did this a lot, then probably Seth was used to making himself as scarce as he wanted to be.

Or—maybe he didn't, because the next thing Seth was digging out of a deceptively slim backpack was a well-creased and crumpled non-disclosure form, and that…

That made Ryan's eyebrows raise.

Some of it was stuff he figured had to be normal; that he wouldn't tell anyone else what happened during filming, that he'd respect the privacy of any other cast and crew, and Ryan hadn't gotten the impression that Boone's show was big enough that they'd worry about someone running to TMZ or whatever to share the hot gossip that he fucked guys sometimes, but there was a very clear financial penalty for doing anything along those lines. Worded in a weaselly enough way that the company could claim ignorance of that fact, too.

"Hrm," said Ryan, and Boone's hand tightened on his thigh. Ryan's senses prickled as he felt Seth shift his weight on the other side of the table too, but when he glanced up, sharp and careful, Seth wasn't looking at either of them and was pawing through his backpack to look for something else.

"It's pretty much the normal form," Boone said, with a grimace that Ryan thought might be apologetic, and Seth murmured, quiet enough that Ryan's sharp ears could pick it out even if he wasn't supposed to, "Almost the normal form."

Ryan read it through a second time, slower, and then paused over the section about use of his own image.

He'd been photographed and videotaped before, he knew nothing would show up that shouldn't — his family had made sure of all of that kind of thing, back when the photographers in town were still using silver nitrate plates and all the way up to modern cell phone cameras.

Ryan didn't have anything to fear from that, but he also didn't need more attention than he already got, and he'd gotten the impression from the number of 'fan cams' and 'remixes' scattering through Boone's google search results that there was a fairly rabid fanbase who might pay extra attention to anyone that showed up on screen.

…then again, Ryan reminded himself, how many people were going to go to Saskatchewan just because of a random dude who was in 5 minutes of a YouTube video?

He looked up at Boone again, pen hovering over the signature line, and had a vivid flash of memory to Boone's clever mouth wrapped around his dick, to Boone's fingers digging little divots into his ass, the soft prickle of his stubble rasping against his thighs.

Ryan signed, and hoped he wasn't actually blushing visibly.

"Atta boy," Boone said, and clapped him on the shoulder. "You need to sort anything out here first? We're planning on heading out this evening, but we can push it back a day if you gotta."

"Can we take Jake?" Ryan asked. "Otherwise I gotta get my brother to look after him, but that's about all I've got on this week."

Seth looked like he was dying to ask just what exactly Ryan did that he could take off at the drop of a hat, but he was also pretty busy scratching behind Jake's ears and calling him a good boy, a choice that had Ryan's estimation of him rising even further than the good impression he'd started with.

Boone grinned broadly at him, and whistled between his teeth to get Jake's ears to prick up. "Yeah, we can definitely take him. Uh, unless you think that, like, he'd scare off a bigfoot. Do you think they can smell dogs? Do you think dogs can smell bigfoot?" Boone looked enamored with the possibilities all of a sudden.

Ryan smothered the urge to laugh and said, quite dryly and extremely truthfully, "I think I can assure you he's not going to scare off a bigfoot. Or vice versa."

Boone focused in on that like a laser, and for a second Ryan got a glimpse of the guy he'd seen on his laptop screen, intent and interested, open to every possibility, however unlikely. "So you do believe in bigfoot!"

"Uh," Ryan said. He knew the smart move would be to lie outright, or to say something vague, but he couldn't bring himself to do that, even if it would maybe be safer. "I don't think most people who claim they saw bigfoot saw much of anything but, uh, you never know what else is out there, I guess?"

"Yeah, exactly," Boone said, "Like, we still find new species every year! It's totally possible! The truth is out there!"

"I think most of those new species are, like, insects and frogs," Seth pointed out, in a dry tone that made it clear this was a long-running back and forth for the two of them.

"Not all of them, Mr National Geographic subscription," Boone said. "There's still a lot that's unknown out there."

"Isn't most of it in the ocean?" Ryan asked, happy to steer the conversation back into safer—or at least less personal—waters.

"God, do you think they'd let us rent a boat to go looking for a kraken or something?" Boone said dreamily, and Ryan met Seth's eyes as the two of them grinned indulgently at Boone before saying in unison, "Nope."

"Spoilsports," Boone groused.

"I am emphatically not spoiling any of your fun," Seth said, quite pointedly, with a quirk of his mouth in Ryan's direction to indicate he probably shouldn't take that personally. It wasn't territorial, just—a reminder.

Ryan wasn't quite shameless enough to make a comment on what he'd be doing to Boone's fun, but he had a feeling that Boone was making the assumption, based on the slow grin stretching across his face.

"You should show me around your place," Boone drawled after a moment. "While you pack, or whatever."

Seth cleared his throat and got to his feet. "And that's my cue. Let's grab an early dinner somewhere and then head out, eh?"

"Joe's down the road does a good burger," Ryan said after a moment. "And they've got some good local breweries on tap, too."

"The place with the green sign up the way?" Seth asked. "Yeah, that'll do. Your pack's in the trunk already right, Jenns?"

"Yep," Boone said easily, not even rising to the bait.

"Well," Seth said, fishing keys out of his pocket. "See you two later. Save some energy for work, will ya?"

"Stamina for days," Boone said and Ryan snorted before he could help himself.

"I'll be packing the 'I told you so'," Seth said. "Ryan, don't let him talk you into anything dumb."

"Don't worry, I can look after myself pretty well by now," Ryan said, and tried to persuade himself that he wasn't already doing something pretty dumb by even going along with any of this whole adventure. At least with Seth around he'd have to be on his best behavior.

"See you in a couple hours then," Seth said, and swung into the SUV, pointedly scooting the driver's seat back a notch, even though he was only maybe an inch taller than Boone.

Ryan noted that, grinned to himself, then lost track completely of anything else that was happening as Boone stood up and climbed into his lap, knees digging into his hip and the couch creaking threateningly under their suddenly combined weight.

"Hi," Ryan said, feeling his pulse kick up instantly.

"How long's it gonna take you to pack?" Boone asked, one hand sliding down to cup Ryan's ass, doing his level best to grope him as much as possible while he was still sitting down.

Ryan didn't need to be a genius to decode that comment.

"Like fifteen minutes. Ten if the tent's at the front of the shed and not the back."

Boone kissed him, warm and friendly and open, the heat between them flaring up immediately again as his tongue pushed into Ryan's mouth, and Ryan let himself forget everything he was worried about, every plan and careful consideration he had to make, and just sank into kissing him back.

"Wanna move this upstairs?" Ryan murmured into Boone's mouth as Boone started tugging his jeans undone, hands busy with the belt and zipper.

"Thought you'd never ask," Boone said.

* * *

Two more orgasms had mellowed Ryan out markedly by the time he and Boone managed to drag themselves firstly out of bed and then secondly out of the shower.

The shower was Ryan's one big indulgence; huge and modern, all glass walls and flat non-slip tiles, enclosed just enough to keep the rest of the bathroom dry but more than big enough to fit them both.

Ryan'd been in there when he was tired and hurting, when he could barely drag one foot in front of the other; when he wasn't able to hide anything or hold anything back; he'd had no doubt that Boone would be able to get in there with him. He hadn't realized he'd like it as much as he did, though.

And it wasn't just because Boone was as cheerfully willing to scrub his back as he was to jerk him off.

"Gonna miss this tomorrow," Ryan said, rolling his shoulders and feeling something in his neck crack and pop. "I mean, hiking's great, but you just can't beat hot water."

"Worried about how dirty you're gonna get?" Boone asked, smirking, and if they'd been anywhere but a shower Ryan would have elbowed him in the ribs. It seemed like a bad idea at that exact moment, though.

"Muddy, sweaty…" Ryan said, letting the words trail off as he turned back to face Boone, letting his eyes and hands run down his chest, water collecting along the lines of muscle and running down the jut of bone. Ryan's eyes caught on his iliac crest and swooped back inward. He could see Boone's dick stirring again, felt want surge inside him. He wasn't sure what it was about Boone, but he couldn't get enough, didn't want to wait or pause, and rather than dealing with that, Ryan let his hand keep drifting downward to touch him again.

Boone hissed at the touch, oversensitive, but he pushed forward into Ryan's hand just as eagerly as he had the first time; exhaled heavily and leaned in to press his mouth to Ryan's again, letting him swallow every sound Boone was making.

Ryan shifted them both carefully, till the spray of water was pounding down on Boone's back, steam misting around them both.

He wasn't going to get cold—Ryan was never cold, could jump into the deepest part of the lake in winter and come out again feeling just as fresh—but he didn't want Boone to get chilled. Not if they were going to really destroy Ryan's utilities bill before heading out of town.

"Fuck it," Ryan mumbled, figuring that just this once he could splurge. It wasn't going to break the bank, and having Boone all warm and slippery pressed against him was absolutely worth it.

* * *

The tent wasn't in the front of the shed, as Ryan discovered when he'd pulled on clothes again and left Boone dozing in his bed.

It wasn't at the back of it, either, and after a mildly frantic five minutes tearing through it and leaving everything an even bigger mess than it had been—Ryan really had to take some time soon to reorganize everything—he crawled back out again and frowned, trying to think when the last time he'd seen it had been.

Technically he could just sleep out in the open—he'd be just fine beside the fire, or under a tree, but that'd invite questions from Boone and Seth that Ryan really didn't want to answer. And it was summer, sure, but the nights still got cold enough that most people would want a tent after the sun finally went down.

He'd almost gotten to the point of digging out his phone to message his brother to find out if he had it when the memory sparked, and Ryan shoved everything back into the shed—definitely a problem for his future—and went to dig around in the garage instead.

With that and everything else he thought he might need stashed in the back of his truck, Ryan did one last walk around, trying to convince himself that he wasn't making a terrible mistake after all.

Being this impulsive wasn't like him, but Ryan liked to think he had good instincts, and they weren't saying anything except for reminding him—he stretched out his shoulders with a rueful grin—that Boone was fun to fool around with. And they were just going out into the woods by the reserve, somewhere Ryan knew like the back of his hand, what was the worst that could happen?

Jake whined softly from his bed by the fireplace as Ryan walked back through the living room, his ears pricked up, ready and waiting for instruction, halfway to his feet already.

"Stay," Ryan told him, with the accompanying hand signal to reinforce it, and Jake curled right back up again, his back to Ryan this time, which felt just a little pointed.

Ryan might let him sleep on the bed a little more often than he probably should, but absolutely not when he had guests. And definitely not when he was already trying to navigate a slightly difficult situation, such as the extremely naked guy currently drooling onto his pillow who had no idea whatsoever about just what exactly Ryan was, other than kind of easy.

Ryan chewed on his lip and second-guessed himself some more.

"Time to get up?" Boone mumbled, opening one eye halfway to look over at Ryan. He had to have only been half asleep at best; Ryan moved quietly most of the time, except for when he reminded himself to make more noise so he didn't startle people.

"Yeah, I think we should head out to meet Seth soon," Ryan said, letting himself be drawn closer to the bed. "You want to shower again?"

"Naw," Boone said, rolling onto his back and stretching, the sheet sliding even further down as he moved. "I somehow don't think you're gonna let me drag you back in, so it can wait." There was a lot of bare skin on display, and Boone reached lazily down to scratch his stomach, a smug grin on his face as he clocked Ryan's eyes moving with his hand, inevitably drawn further south.

Ryan kept looking, but tucked his thumbs into his pockets in the hope of reminding himself not to do anything to make them late. He didn't think he was imagining the slightly disappointed look on Boone's face, but they just didn't have time.

"C'mon," Ryan said, turning away at last to grab another shirt from his dresser to throw on after they'd eaten. He wasn't going to wreck a nice t-shirt on a hike, but he still wanted to dress up a little for dinner, even if it was just burgers and beers with a couple guys he hardly knew.

Not at all because part of his brain wanted to consider it a date, even if Jonesy would be effectively third-wheeling them for the next couple days.

* * *

Ryan kept quiet as they wolfed down a quick dinner, happy to let Boone ramble on about what he hoped to find out in the woods, and to let Seth tease him dryly.

Seth had paused a few times, leaving enough space in the conversation for Ryan to jump in if he'd wanted to, but he'd just tipped his pint glass a little in Seth's direction and let him run with it.

It was fun to watch the two of them go back and forth, and Ryan didn't feel left out. It was more like he was a guest who was more than welcome to sit in and enjoy the latest segment of a show that'd been going on long before he'd arrived. And if he didn't want whatever dumb shit came into his mind over the next few days immortalized on the internet until the end of time, he should probably keep right on keeping his mouth shut, for the most part.

And—that was what he was in reality, wasn't it, he thought.

He was a guest, he wasn't even sure if he'd end up on camera for certain—wouldn't be sad about it if he didn't, that was for sure—but he'd get to go along with them and just… keep an eye on things. For their sake, and his own. It was best for everyone, and if that meant Ryan got a little more time with a man he found interesting and attractive, one who'd murmured promises into his ear about crawling into the same sleeping bag later—well, that was just a bonus.

Ryan hadn't had to speak up much for a while after that, either.

He'd agreed with Boone and Seth's planned hiking route, compared their map to memory and figured it would be fine before suggesting which trailhead they could leave the truck by—it was central enough and there was nothing much to worry about in the area, as well as enough of a challenging hike that he thought they'd find it worthwhile, or at least convincing.

They’d left the rental car parked up at their hotel, tossing their gear into the back of his truck on the grounds that it had more space for people and gear, “—and I don’t think we’re allowed dogs in a rental,” Seth had added, with an apologetic grimace.

Ryan didn’t mind driving, though; it gave him an excuse to be quiet and concentrate, planning ahead as much as he could.

The drive out there was easy enough, with Seth and Boone talking through their initial plan for the day, ready to take advantage of the late sunset and long twilight before making camp, and all Ryan had to do was pay attention to traffic and make encouraging noises every now and then.

They'd put Jake in the back—"To guard the gear," Boone had joked, before scratching behind his ears in a way that made Jake sprawl out in bliss and look nothing like the well-trained working dog he was—and Ryan figured that if nothing else, Jake would be a second pair of ears and eyes to keep them safe, in the unlikely event they needed it.

He hadn't expected that Seth would hang over the tailgate the moment they parked up to hold out his hand for Jake to sniff again, waiting patiently till Ryan gave them both the okay, and Seth had melted almost immediately, devolving into what Ryan could only describe as cooing.

Boone caught Ryan's raised eyebrow and grinned, clear affection in his own expression. "Dogs and babies," Boone said. "He's a sucker for both of them, even if he denies it," and Seth flipped them both off with one hand while running his other hand down Jake's back and continuing to talk to him in low tones.

Ryan caught a flash of something unusual as the wind changed, just the very faintest hint of it drumming across his senses, but by the time he'd turned around again there was nothing visible, just Seth hauling his gear out with one last pat to Jake's head, camera already set on his shoulder. Boone was leaning into the cab of the truck to grab something from the footwell, just his lower half visible.

Ryan exchanged a grin with Seth, as Seth made a production of zooming in on Boone and said, not quietly at all, "That'll be popular in the comments section."

"Fuck off," Boone yelled back, before straightening up again with the last stray thermos that had fallen out of his bag and rolled under the seat, apparently. "Let's get started."

Ryan resettled his pack on his shoulders and looked at the rise of the scrubby hill ahead of them.

And waited.

And then waited some more.

He'd expected they'd start hiking right away one they were geared up—try to see what they could before the sun went down—but apparently they had to film several angles of them getting out of the truck first, and Boone introducing the segment in three different ways, with slightly different intonations, and at least two different arguments with Seth which made Ryan bark out laughter, before slapping a hand over his own mouth self-consciously as Seth swung the camera towards him.

Off-screen, Boone smirked, and pitched his voice so the mic would pick it up more clearly. "—and this is our friend Ryan, who's kindly going to be a local guide for us this week."

Boone paused for a beat, and let his voice drop, low and husky and going right through Ryan, who'd heard that tone in very different circumstances not quite two hours ago, and shuddered helplessly as a result.

And then he heard the words Boone was saying.

"Ryan here doesn't believe in the bigfoot rumours, but we'll have to see about changing his mind, eh?"

"That's not what I said," Ryan blurted out, before remembering that it would in fact be better if people thought that was what he thought.

Boone grinned at him. "Or maybe he does. We'll see what happens."

"That take'll do," Seth said, "Now let's get moving, unless you've got any jokes you need to make now."

"I'm good," Boone said, and he loped back from the trailhead to grab his pack and a bedroll. "You wanna put a GoPro on Ryan as well?"

"Might as well," Seth said, exchanging a look Ryan couldn't read with Boone, and then he was directing Ryan to sit on the tailgate of the truck while Seth did something arcane with buckles and a tiny camera on Ryan's shoulder. That close, it was impossible not to notice the rich brown of Seth's eyes, or to be unconscious of how good he looked, cheerful and energetic, his pack sitting lightly on his shoulders, the bigger camera slung over one. Ryan had loaded that thing into the back of the truck, and he knew it was heavier than Seth was making it look.

You probably had to be pretty fit to lug that much gear around the woods—or various 'haunted' houses, going by what Ryan had learned in his quick tour of their YouTube channel—and Ryan thought, for the first time, that maybe the two of them weren't going to struggle keeping up with him after all.

"We can take a break whenever," Boone said, breaking into Ryan's thoughts, "I'd like to get a couple hours in before the sun goes down, and then I guess we can just stick around the campsite and see what happens. There's apparently some activity along this trail, according to the boards."

"He means reddit," Seth stage-whispered, and Ryan laughed, like he was meant to.

Tried not to think about how often he was out on this trail himself and just who might've noticed it, who wouldn't know to keep it to themself.

Maybe Ryan had gotten a little overconfident and lackadaisical. Just because it wasn't the 1800s and he didn't have to worry about assholes wanting to hunt him down and stick his pelt up on their cabin walls so much these days was no excuse for being careless.

"Let's get going then," Ryan said. "You wanna camp near the river, right?"

"Yeah," Boone said, and he beamed. "I guess you know this area pretty well, huh?"

Ryan swallowed. "You could say that."

Boone glanced over at Seth—checking he was recording, Ryan figured—and then added, "So, Ryan, you ever see a bigfoot?"

"I've seen some pretty big foot _prints_ ," Ryan joked, and Seth and Boone laughed, and started up the winding faint trail, falling into an easy rhythm almost immediately, matching their strides. Jake waited for the okay from Ryan and then raced ahead, bounding down the trail ahead of them and circling back every now and then as if to point out that they were moving much too slowly for his taste.

"You know, we should've gotten Jake to sign a release too," Boone said, deadpan. "He's going to be very popular on the internet."

Ryan laughed; he got that reaction pretty much any time he took Jake around people. The blue eyes and striking color of his coat always got him a lot of requests to pat the cute dog, or to take his picture, and—Ryan wasn't too proud to admit it—he'd also gotten a few people's numbers after a conversation about how great his dog was. "He is occasionally an instagram model," Ryan said. "Very limited run, though."

"Ooh, you gotta share," Boone said instantly, his phone appearing in his hand like magic. "C'mon, what's the handle?"

"I'll tell you later," Ryan said, with a glance towards Seth, quietly recording all of this, and Seth just shrugged one shoulder at him and then gently directed Boone back into his quick historical overview about the area, the geography, and the First Nations people who had made their winter camps there.

* * *

Part of the discussion they'd had while Ryan had been tossing up whether or not to go along with this whole thing had been around just how much input he'd have. Seth had given him a quick sketch of how he and Boone usually worked, and what they'd be expecting from him. Ryan didn't mind peace and quiet—preferred it, in a lot of ways—but he hadn't been interested in entertaining the idea of creeping through the woods without making a sound, in case they 'scared something off'.

The fact that he would have an unfair advantage in knowing exactly what they wouldn't be seeing out there was only a little bit of a factor.

Seth had assured him they weren't all that hardcore about that angle—"It's not like the people who claim they saw something were trying to sneak up on it, you know?"—but Ryan had still felt uneasy about anything along those lines.

"So now we just… walk?" Ryan asked, as Boone wound down on his story, and they cleared the first ridge and left the trailhead solidly out of sight, the hills rolling low and covered in brush all around them. "You want me to do any talking, or not?"

"Like we said at dinner," Boone started, "we're not that crazy about being super stealthy or whatever. Not like, you know, those ghost hunting shows and all that. You'd go nuts listening to every little twig snap all night, you know?"

"And besides, the audience wants to hear Boone give me shit for half the time we're out here," Seth added, pushing a branch out of his way and letting go just in time for it to swipe at Boone, who yelped and swatted at his ass.

Ryan laughed.

"Anyway, we're like a mile away from the trailhead," Boone pointed out reasonably, "If there was a bigfoot here then everyone would've seen it by the time phone cameras got invented."

"Yeah, I bet that does make it… more difficult," Ryan said, hoping there wasn't anything in his voice giving away the immediate reaction he'd had to that. Of course Boone would cut right to the most rational comment, and he had no way of knowing that of course it was one of the things that gave Ryan nightmares, knowing how easily he could get caught these days if he wasn't careful.

At least the equally widespread invention of photo-editing software meant it'd be hard for anyone to claim they hadn't just doctored the images.

"You realize the most exciting thing you're going to see is, like, a moose or buffalo or something, right?" Ryan asked, a few minutes later. "And also if we see a moose, we're staying way the fuck back from it."

Ryan's a bad-ass scary motherfucker in his own right, if he needs to be, but even he doesn't mess with moose.

"Yeah, no kidding," Boone said. "Moose always get the right of way, not fucking around with that."

"Glad we're all on the same page," Ryan said, feeling the dry grass crunch under his feet, and without quite intending to, he settled into his usual woods routine, stride lengthening as he relaxed and let his focus widen to take in more of the surroundings, the soft heading-towards-night sounds of the woods in his ears, his awareness open and ready to alert, but picking up nothing out of the ordinary.

Nothing aside from the steady heartbeats just ahead of him, working under the slight exertion of carrying a pack and picking their way through sparse underbrush. Ryan noted them with a sense of satisfaction, filing them into his memory as safe, familiar; known. Felt his own heart rate speed up just a little as Boone looked back over his shoulder and asked, "Having trouble keeping up, Ryan?" while smirking broadly.

Without quite intending to Ryan took a couple easy steps fast, drawing even with him, and just raised one eyebrow. "No, I'm good. How're you guys finding this, then?"

"I mean, it's Saskatchewan," Seth said, like that was an answer, and Ryan and Boone shared a look in Canadian that spoke volumes.

"He can't help being from Texas," Boone said after a moment. "I keep hoping we'll turn him."

"Never gonna happen," Seth said cheerfully, but Ryan had also seen him noticing how good Boone's ass looked in his hiking pants, and kind of suspected that whatever turning was going on wasn't anything to do with national pride.

Not that it was any of his business, he hurriedly reminded himself. He was just doing this to look out for his own interests, and to maybe hook up with Boone again if he could, it wasn't like it was going to mean anything. It was just sex. And—a couple days of his time.

Ryan scratched the back of his neck and wondered if he maybe had to start examining his own motives a little better, because that hadn't even been all that convincing and he was just talking to himself.

"Oh, you need bug spray?" Seth asked, reaching for a canister in the pocket of his pack. "We've got, uh, everything."

"Oh, no, I'm good," Ryan said hurriedly. He didn't have that much of a problem with bugs, and the smell of the chemical sprays gave him a headache when it was too close to his skin for too long; it was just overwhelming with enhanced senses. And he didn't like to dull them out when he was out in the woods. "Guess I don't smell all that good to them mostly, I'm lucky."

Boone swatted at something on his forearm and sighed. "Lucky for you. I think I'm mosquito cordon bleu or something."

"All you can eat buffet?" Seth suggested, with a wicked edge to his smirk that said he knew exactly how that sounded.

"Just saying," Boone said, "the more innuendo you make while we're out here, the more you have to cut when we get home."

"Maybe I'll leave it in," Seth said, raising one eyebrow. Ryan noted with a snort that he wasn't arguing the substance of what Boone had said.

Boone echoed him, reaching over to give Seth a friendly punch to the upper arm. "Last time you had to deal with Twitter yelling at us both for a week straight, you really wanna do that again?"

"…point," Seth said, but even Ryan could tell he'd taken half a second too long to say it. Too long to really be a joke, too long to be anything but him thinking about it for a beat longer than he should have.

Maybe Ryan should not have gone along with this whole thing after all.

His silence was apparently noticeable, as Boone laughed shortly—and Ryan didn't have to have known him for long to be able to easily read that as fake—and said, in a too-chipper tone, "So, how bout them Blue Jays?"

"They're not gonna repeat, like. Ever," Seth said, seizing onto the new topic with what Ryan could also easily identify as desperate gratitude. Shit, was he going to have to put up with three days of this? At least if he and Boone did hook up again that was an hour or so of not swimming in other people's sexual tension.

He hoped.

"You're just bitter," Boone said, and rambled into a lengthy dissection of the Rangers bullpen, and all of their shortcomings.

Ryan kind of followed baseball—kind of followed hockey and the CFL, too, which at least were a little closer to home—and he was lost after about a minute, shrugging it off and letting himself zone out as Seth and Boone argued back and forth, the tone well-worn and familiar enough that he was fairly sure they ran this track every other week.

It meant he could pay more attention to their surroundings again, too; pick up the tiny rustles and creaks of bushes and the wind, of small animals moving through their twilight routines, and reacting to the sudden incursion of humans into their habitat, trilling sounds of alert as Jake bounded through the bushes just off the trail, exploring and enjoying a chance to get out and run, even if Ryan wasn't running with him.

Out of habit, he let his senses stretch out into the whole area, breathing in slow and deep and categorizing everything as it came back to him: the herd of deer upwind of them, the last of the late afternoon heat shimmering off the ground and through the leaf litter, the three day old bear scat a few hundred feet off the trail. Ryan paused at that to check even more carefully—encountering a bear would also count as 'too interesting'—but it was long gone.

A familiar scent caught his attention and he faltered for a moment, eyes closing as he tried to tease out the memory attached to it, and he hadn't realized he'd drifted out of step until Boone cleared his throat, and said, "Hey, Ryan? Ryan?"

Ryan shook himself, waited an extra beat to be sure his eyes were back to normal—well, to what Boone was used to—and hurried to catch up to them. They were only about ten feet ahead of him, both turned to see what he was doing, curiosity clear on Boone's face, and a kind of rueful reserve on Seth's.

"Sorry, I thought I heard something?" Ryan said.

Boone was just as eager to buy that story as Ryan had hoped, and immediately yanked out a couple of electronic detection devices that Ryan privately labeled the revenge of RadioShack, and mostly just hoped that they weren't going to lead to Boone electrocuting himself.

Ryan had a certificate in first aid—it had seemed like a good idea, hunting accidents happened—but he knew damn well even this far out of town it was going to suck to have to try and call in any kind of medevac.

"He does know what he's doing with that," Seth said, sotto voce, clearly identifying Ryan's dilemma immediately. "It only looks like something from Frankenstein's lab because he never puts it away properly."

"Fuck you, I do too," Boone said, before cursing as one electrode lead was apparently knotted up too badly to come loose, and Seth walked over with the big camera in hand and made a production of zooming in very pointedly while openly laughing at Boone.

Ryan was laughing at them both too, and for once didn't even hide it when Seth turned to get him in frame, the little red LED on the camera blinking at him in time with Ryan's pulse. It felt—friendly.

* * *

Whatever Boone had been trying to find with his detector was—shocker—not showing up in any meaningful way, so he'd stowed it again and they'd hiked on another couple of miles, till they were close to the river.

Quick agreement led them to decide to camp there for the first night, and a friendly argument requiring rock-paper-scissors as a tie-break determined how they were going to split the camp chores.

Ryan set to building a small campfire easily enough, ringing it with a double layer of stones and clearing the greenery well back from it. It was always better to be safe than sorry in fire season. He got the fire going, watching it carefully until the first flames started to die down as the bigger, denser chunk of fallen wood caught and burned steadily.

He'd just turned away from that to start thinking about getting his tent up when Boone sat down beside him and started carefully sectioning out the fire pit, shifting some of the now-glowing coals closer to the flatter rocks Ryan had found for one end.

"Great minds think alike, eh?" Boone said, maneuvering a battered grill plate between the two that Ryan had mentally planned to use for whatever they made for breakfast, and Ryan just sat there for a few minutes longer, enjoying the comforting heat and light of the fire dancing over his skin, and the way Boone's solid thigh pressed against his was giving him goosebumps entirely at odds with the last lingering warmth of the fading day.

Despite the fact they'd all eaten only a few hours earlier, Boone started pulling more food out of his pack: strips of meat, camp bread and some hastily cut root vegetables. Ryan was thoroughly on board with that plan—he could pretty much always eat.

And everything tasted better cooked over a campfire, regardless of how hard you'd been working.

Boone and Seth moved around each other like they'd done it a thousand times, not even needing to talk as they split up the rest of the chores. Boone had a substantial meal on their thin metal plates within twenty minutes, piling Ryan's just as high as he did his own and Seth's.

"Damn," Ryan said, eyeing the steak and feeling his stomach grumble audibly. “This looks good.”

Normally he ate a lot more than most guys his size; his metabolism burned hot and fast and he always felt better if he could stay on top of that, but it was usually hard to do that without normal people noticing. Boone and Seth didn't blink an eye, wolfing down their own meals with enough enthusiasm that Ryan could almost wonder if they were more like him than not.

He was pretty sure he'd have noticed that already, though.

Or that Boone would've noticed him.

Ryan hadn't run into a lot of other cryptids—it wasn't like they had a convention or a mailing list or whatever—but he'd met a couple, and there seemed to be something about them that he responded to, something that sparked off senses he could barely even describe with more than instinct.

They sat around the fire for a while after eating, talking shit with the cameras off, giving Jake a few scraps of leftover meat to supplement the specialty dog food that made up probably half the weight of Ryan's pack. He didn't want to have to explain how normally he could hunt well enough for himself and Jake, although he did laugh helplessly at the betrayed look Jake gave him when Ryan set down a bowl filled with that instead of fresh game. Boone raised an eyebrow, curious, and Ryan told him it wasn't worth explaining, which at least Boone seemed to accept at face value.

When it finally started getting properly dark and therefore atmospherically spooky enough—Ryan had asked, and Seth, poker-faced, told him there was an official scale for that—they set up camp chairs where the firelight would flicker most effectively over them but also wouldn't mean they'd be breathing in smoke.

Seth set up the camera and checked light levels and audio, and cursed Boone out when he just reeled off half a Dierks Bentley song while wildly off-key, instead of the show tagline Seth had been asking him for.

Seth promised payback 'when you least expect it', and with that out of their system, they settled back into work mode like someone had flicked a switch, both of them intent on what they were doing.

Ryan, as the literal and stand-in audience, just sat back and tried to only laugh when he was clearly supposed to.

Boone pulled out a few of the creepier tales he'd been able to find in his research on the area, his voice low and engaging, telling them well enough that even Ryan—who certainly had less to fear from the woods and knew damn well that bigfoot wasn't going to attack them—felt a shiver run down his spine.

Boone wrapped up his story, signing off with a line even Ryan already recognized as part of his schtick, and Seth put away the cameras, starting to tidy up their campsite ahead of bedtime. Ryan unobtrusively took charge of storing the food they'd brought, tossing a rope over a tree bough high overhead and hauling it up a safe distance from their camp, and made sure to let his scent linger around it.

The solid, ordinary woodsman's skills he'd developed should be enough to keep them in good order, and Jake's sharp nose and ears would be an excellent second line of defense, but Ryan wasn't above stacking the deck in their favor.

As he got back to the camp, Seth had already vanished into his own tent, his head and shoulders outlined against the canvas wall by lantern light as he sat up—reading, Ryan thought. Boone was still waiting, long legs stretched out by the fire, a tiny grin on his face that stretched out into a broad one when he saw Ryan.

Ryan paused a second, and almost missed his footing.

He'd wondered what the situation would be, whether they'd just be pretending nothing had happened between them, but as Ryan made his way back to the fire, Boone stood up and walked over to him, slinging a casual arm around his waist. Ryan leaned in automatically, trying to wipe the ridiculous grin off his face. Beside the fire, Jake curled up into a tighter ball and Ryan could've sworn that if dogs could eye-roll… he would be.

Whatever, Ryan didn't need his opinion on human interactions anyway.

"I don't know about you," Boone said softly, and with a goofy waggle of his eyebrows that Ryan had not needed in order to pick up on his hint, "But I'm not feelin' that sleepy."

Ryan couldn't help his gaze from skipping to Seth's tent.

"Ah, I seem to remember from earlier that you can be… rowdy."

Boone snickered appreciatively, ducked his head in acknowledgment. "You'll just have to make sure I've got some kind of encouragement to be very careful. Or maybe just keep my mouth full."

Ryan was about to dig for some kind of response to that—he wasn't sure what, considering the idea was whiting out his brain all over again—when Seth called out quite audibly, "Please stop flirting in front of god and nature and all the fucking mosquitoes, I have noise-canceling headphones, okay?" and the light in his tent switched off.

Ryan's face went flaming red, and even Boone was a little flushed, though it wasn't nearly so noticeable in the dim light.

"Well, we've got our marching orders, then," he said, and Ryan followed him into the other tent, courteously pitched on the far side of the fire from Seth's.

Ryan was still replaying that last line in his head; was Seth thinking about them having sex? Was that a deal-breaker for Ryan, knowing that someone else knew for sure, and could probably hear if they made the effort?

He had a suspicion that he might be more okay with that than he would have previously expected.

But there was no time to dwell on any of those second or third thoughts, not with Boone skimming out of his pants, sliding them down over his hips as he stepped out of them and his briefs all at the same time, tugging the loose t-shirt over his head and dropping it beside the bedroll, gloriously and immediately naked.

"Planning on catching up any time soon, Ry?" he asked, genial as ever, and Ryan scrambled to follow suit, practically throwing himself at Boone the moment he was undressed, tipping the two of them back into the soft foam mattresses they'd laid down, pushed together for some feeble additional protection from the ground.

"I do love nature," Boone said, getting a handful of Ryan's ass and grinding up against his hip, all warm muscle and long limbs, pleasantly solid underneath him.

"You mean you're an exhibitionist," Ryan retorted, letting his own hands do some wandering.

Boone made such gratifying noises when he did.

"I mean… it would be wrong not to enjoy the bounties of the natural world, is all."

Ryan laughed helplessly at that, buried his face in the side of Boone's throat and could feel his pulse thudding away comfortingly just under his mouth. Could hear his heart beating, even from that distance. Could hear Seth's too, actually, as his senses expanded out to take in more of the woods around them, and that was—

That was invading Seth's privacy, Ryan reminded himself firmly, and he tried to dull things down again.

"Hey, where'd you go?" Boone asked, his hands drawing soothing patterns on Ryan's back, extremely effectively grounding him back into his body.

"Sorry," Ryan said, brushing another kiss over Boone's mouth, indulging himself by nipping at his lower lip. "Just thinking."

"Well, less thinking, more doing," Boone said, and rolled them over, getting his hands exactly where Ryan wanted them a moment later.

It didn't take long after that to leave them mutually satisfied and sleepy with it; no one was going to really go for super athletic sex after hiking for a few hours, Ryan figured, and he was more than happy with how things had turned out.

"Night," Boone said softly, one hand firmly attached to Ryan's side, keeping the two of them pressed together even after, and Ryan grinned to himself in the darkness and let himself doze off.

* * *

Boone, it turned out, was not at all a morning person, especially when it came to camping.

The sun had been well and truly up for a few hours and the birds were on round three of the dawn chorus by the time he dragged himself grumbling out of the tent to join Ryan and Seth around the fire.

He'd not even sat down before Seth pressed a cup of coffee into his hands, and Ryan would've sworn that he didn't open his eyes until he'd downed at least half of it.

"Morning, sunshine," Seth said cheerfully.

Coupled with the fact he'd quietly and efficiently split the breakfast-making chores with Ryan once he got up, that suggested that he wasn't mad about whatever amount of noise Ryan and Boone had made last night. Or about the… facts of what they'd been doing.

It made one little bit of tension that Ryan had been carrying around dissipate at last.

Boone had said Seth would be fine, and Ryan had wanted to believe him, but Ryan was also well aware that people tended to want to think the best of their friends. Especially if they hadn't seemed to have noticed yet that said friend seemed to have a bit of a thing for them. And Ryan liked Seth, and didn't want to step on his toes, so it was nice to discover that he hadn't done so just by virtue of being Boone's current hook-up.

"Please tell me there's bacon," Boone said, mostly into his coffee cup, and Ryan let himself have the familiarity of ruffling his hair and said, "Of course there's bacon, what do you think we are?"

"You're the best," Boone said gratefully, "I give you each of my first born children or whatever, is there more coffee?"

"I told you he's helpless in the morning," Seth said, not under his breath at all, and Ryan just laughed, poured the flask they had warming on the edge of the fire into Boone's mug and said, "I didn't disbelieve you!"

Boone squinted, looked from Ryan to Seth and then back to Ryan, his mouth twisting wryly, and Ryan caught his breath at how much that made him want to haul Boone right back to bed. He swallowed the urge down.

He'd had a lot of practice making sure he had self-control.

"Oh no," Boone said. "I've made a terrible mistake. Now you're going to gang up on me."

"Yep," Seth said. "Now eat up, we should get moving if you want to get across the river before it's too late in the afternoon."

Jake barked agreement, and Boone slumped further back in the camp chair, nearly tipping himself onto his ass. "Great. All _three_ of you are picking on me."

* * *

The first part of their morning hike was almost silent. Ryan was pretty sure that Boone was still waking the rest of the way up; he'd hardly said a word while they were breaking camp.

At some unspoken signal, Seth slowed and drifted behind the two of them, hauling his camera out and giving them a hearty 'carry on' signal.

Ryan bit his lip, but tried gamely not to look like he was as uncomfortable as he felt; letting Boone tell him all about what he'd discovered about the area around the river—about thirty percent true, from what Ryan knew.

He drew Ryan out into an explanation of the woods from the perspective of the locals; what he was used to seeing, what kinds of animals they could expect, and Ryan burbled on for a good five minutes before remembering the tape was running and stopping mid-sentence.

Boone gave him a sneaky grin, slung an arm around his shoulders in a way that Ryan hoped came across as just purely friendly, and said "I knew you knew a lot more than you thought!"

Ryan choked and then tried to cover it up with a cough.

"Anyway," Ryan went on, "I don't think you're going to see any bigfoots or ogres or whatever else you're after, but the river is beautiful, and it's almost warm enough to swim in."

"Oh, that will definitely help the viewer numbers," Seth said cheerfully. "We're for sure doing that."

Boone looked slightly betrayed. "It's glacier-fed!"

Ryan looked back over his shoulder to see Seth laughing, a broad grin on his face, camera resting on his shoulder like it weighed nothing, and he winked at Ryan, inviting him in on the joke.

"It'll be bracing," Seth said, and Ryan found some reserves of smart-ass he hadn't expected to be willing to bring out around near-strangers and added, "Yeah, it'll be character-building."

"I hate you both," Boone said, and started walking faster.

Still unerringly towards the river, Ryan noted, letting his own senses spread out gently to get the lay of the land, an updated idea of who and what might be around them.

* * *

They reached the river not long after lunch—they'd gotten a relatively early start after all, and Boone and Seth were no slouches when it came to hiking speed; Ryan didn't have to slow down for them much at all.

The sun was blazing, high in the sky and not a patch of cloud to be seen; all three of them had changed into lighter clothing when they'd taken a break mid-morning, and Ryan had been deeply grateful he'd remembered to dig out sunglasses as well as a hat. His shirt was sticking to him, and Boone was sweating obviously as well, the back of his t-shirt slightly see-through with it when he swung his pack down to the ground and bent over to dig through it for a snack.

Ryan glanced over to catch Seth looking just the same as he was, although this time the camera wasn't out.

He was going to be very glad when they did hit the water; Ryan could do with cooling off in more ways than one.

After a pit stop to check the maps Boone had brought, eyeing the lengthy set of switchbacks ahead, Boone and Seth agreed with Ryan's suggestion that they make camp on that side, before spending the afternoon in the area where Boone had found the largest concentration of reported sightings: along both sides of the river banks.

Ryan thought about how much he liked swimming in summer and resigned himself to having to hike further out into the backcountry in future if he wanted to really… let down his hair, so to speak. The internet was a curse and a blessing.

The river was lower than it'd been the last time Ryan had been out that way, the current moving along at a reasonable rate, but probably not outside the realm of safety for strong swimmers.

Ryan took pity on Jake, who'd been waiting by his heels, trembling with eagerness, and gave him the go-ahead signal, laughing to himself as Jake immediately bounded out into the water, splashing around with abandon before swimming out to a half-submerged rock and trying gamely to drag it back to shore. Ryan had to salute the ambition.

He couldn't resist the urge to join him almost immediately; pulling his shirt off and dropping it onto the camp chair he'd lugged over to the riverbank next to a towel and his pack. He kicked off his shoes, paused, eyed Seth with the camera again and resigned himself to either a change of clothes or letting his shorts dry out again in the sun.

Ryan followed Jake in, letting the icy water curl around his calves and swirl up around his chest as he kept walking deeper out.

Seth followed him, with the lighter handheld camera steady in his hands, his pants rolled up to the knee and slides getting just enough grip on the smooth river pebbles that he could pan over Ryan—now in the water up to his neck and floating happily—and Jake, and then back to Boone still on the shore, giving them both a skeptical look.

"I can't believe you both just walked in," Boone said, toeing off his boots without even bothering to unlace them, and unselfconsciously shedding his shirt as well. His shorts revealed the muscular thighs Ryan had already appreciated in more private moments; skimming over the curve of his ass and showing off the top of his abs, the light fuzz of chest hair above his waistband.

Check it: Ryan was definitely glad his lower body was submerged in cold water.

"It's not that cold," Seth shrugged, kicking water towards Boone, and laughing helplessly as Jake spun around and tried to chase those droplets, scattering water all over Seth and Ryan in the process.

Ryan let the current tug him a little deeper, stretched out to push back against it and keep himself in place with the occasional kick. He whistled for Jake, who came bounding back towards him and saved Boone from getting an unasked for shower of wet dog in the shallows.

"It fucking is," Boone yelped, taking one step into the swirling eddy along the shoreline and giving both Seth and Ryan his best betrayed expression. "You have got to be shitting me."

"You get used to it," Ryan said, swimming closer to shore again so that Boone wouldn't have to yell.

Seth waded out deeper, seemingly unconcerned by the water licking up the cuffs of his pants, darkening the fabric as he got soaked to mid-thigh. "Yeah, it's good, come on. You were complaining about being overheated for like the last hour."

"Ugh, fine," Boone said, taking a deep breath to steel himself before striding purposefully deeper and deeper into the river, till he was in up to mid-chest and only the widening eyes gave away the fact he was feeling the cold.

Seth shot him a thumbs up with his free hand and said, "Thank you for not cursing the entire way this time, I appreciate not having to censor all your audio when we get home."

"Jesus fucking motherfucking god," Boone said, very calmly. "I think my dick's going to fall off. What is wrong with you two."

"Spoke too soon," Seth sighed, but Ryan got the impression that he was only saying it because Boone expected him to; that they had gotten some good footage already, even if what it was good for was mostly about objectifying Boone and not so much finding mysterious cryptids or aliens or what the fuck ever else it was that Boone thought he was looking for.

That seemed to be kind of the niche the show sat in, though, so Ryan figured Boone had to have made his peace with it to play into it so much.

"I guess it's not too bad once you're in," Boone allowed, before diving under and coming up right next to Ryan, his hair slicked back like an affable seal, a dangerous grin on his mouth.

Ryan got as far as "Oh—" and out of respect for Seth swallowed the 'shit', caught just off guard enough that Boone's tackle legitimately knocked him down and right under the water again, till they both came up spluttering and laughing.

"Just keep it PG!" Seth yelled, and filmed the two of them trying to duck each other for a few more minutes before going back to shore to set down the camera and then running back in to join in the chaos himself.

Ryan was breathless before too long, mostly from laughing too hard, coughing a little every time he forgot himself and inhaled some water, enjoying the contrast of the hot sun and the cool water; the comfort of play and casual touch, the three of them indiscriminately trying to half-drown each other and shifting sides and allegiances at the drop of a hat.

Boone was the one to tear himself away and paddle back to shore first, throwing himself down onto his towel and breathing heavily, grunting as he stretched out in a way that made Ryan blush again before he got control of his face.

"I should probably go get dry clothes," Seth said a little while later, starting to head back to shore himself. "I think Boone wants to film along here before dinner, and while he might not mind his pants sticking to him while he does the whole spiel, I do. Also this battery is dying, motherfucker. I told you we need to buy a new one."

Boone waved a hand at him without even rolling over to look up. "Sounds good, we'll be here, you know what you're doing," and he wriggled some more, already half dried off, the sunlight refracting through the last tiny scattering of water droplets on his shoulders, running down his back.

Ryan should _definitely_ stay in the river a little longer, he thought.

"You wanna grab the spare pants from my pack for me too?" he called out to Seth, who just yelled "Roger that," over his shoulder and then pushed through the underbrush along the makeshift trail they'd made from their camping spot to the river.

Ryan let the water push him around for a bit more and then reluctantly dragged himself out as well.

He still felt fine, but Boone would probably start wondering or worrying about him if he stayed in too much longer, and Ryan didn't think he could come up with any sort of convincing bullshit on the spot about why he didn't feel the cold. He padded back out and stretched out on his own towel, just next to Boone, not quite touching but close enough to hear him breathing.

Ryan grinned helplessly; exercise and sex and good company were an absolutely killer combination, and he hadn't felt so relaxed and satisfied in months. Maybe even longer. It was certainly working out better than he'd had any right to expect.

And Ryan was just congratulating himself silently on how well it was all working out despite his earlier misgivings when there was a god-almighty crashing sound from the direction of their camp, and a yell that had to have come from Seth because Ryan knew damn well they were the only people around for a couple miles at least, and adrenaline had him shooting to his feet before he'd even finished registering the sound.

"What the fuck is that—?" Boone said, scrambling to his feet a bare second behind Ryan.

"We should go," Ryan replied grimly, not bothering to grab anything but just whistling for Jake to follow along as he sprinted back up the rough ground, not bothering to dodge anything smaller than a sapling as he took the fastest route possible between the river and their camp.

Jake was at his side the whole way, and Ryan tried to reassure himself that it couldn't be that bad a problem if Jake wasn't reacting to anything, but he still felt relief so strong it shook him to his core as he crashed through the last set of bushes to see Seth standing by the fire pit, fists clenched, breathing hard.

Boone was right on Ryan's heels, making even more noise as he followed, and Ryan took a deep breath before intending to yell that everything was fine, looking Seth over from that vantage point just to check. He looked unhurt, all in one piece, clothing dry and undamaged, what Ryan would've said was the best case scenario.

What he would've said right up to the point when Seth whipped around at the sound of their approach, before either of them could call out, and Ryan and Boone both could see the way he went from alert and poised for action to wearing—to _faking_ —an expression of worry.

And Ryan wished he'd thought ahead enough to stop right in front of Boone, to block him from seeing, but Ryan hadn't realized in time either, and Boone was smart enough to know right away that something was going on.

Because Ryan might be trying his very best to look perfectly human, might get away with it in front of most people… but the second he'd heard the commotion it had flared along his senses. He'd automatically gone into a defensive posture, and that meant that he was now intimately aware that Seth was not, in fact, an ordinary human cameraman slash director.

As they kept rushing closer, Ryan could see in his peripheral vision Boone's face broadcasting his clear worry, warring with confusion. And Ryan could just pick out the near inaudible sound of Seth muttering "aw, shit" under his breath.

Could see the way that he straightened up and widened his eyes, deliberately trying to look like he was still freaked out.

"Hey!" Seth said, talking faster than Ryan had heard him in the entirety of their limited acquaintance. "Glad you guys are okay, I think I surprised a deer or something, it ran over the tent, you, uh, wanna give me a hand over here, Boone?"

Ryan narrowed his eyes, and slowed his steps, not missing how Seth's eyes kept darting back to him. Not at all missing the implication in the way that Seth immediately tried to interpose his body between Ryan and Boone.

Okay. And mark that one in the column for 'and Seth knows exactly what Ryan is.'

Ryan took a deep breath, fought the urge to just grab Jake and leave.

They'd probably be just fine, especially since Seth had a whole lot more going on than Ryan had originally realized. And nothing could be more of an indication of guilt than running the fuck away, and Ryan was too proud and too stubborn for that. Sticking around was the only way that he was going to be able to talk his way out of this without Boone getting suspicious about either of them.

Boone had kept moving when Ryan stopped, drifting to a halt right by the flattened tent, the lumps of their rolled up sleeping bags visible under the canvas and scattered with dust and bits of sod that the animal—Ryan would eat his hat if it had actually been an deer—had shed while making its getaway.

He closed his eyes long enough to focus in on the scent, on the rapidly vanishing sensation of something supernatural just on the very edges of his awareness. It felt… familiar. Ryan inhaled again and got it; the were-elk that he’d seen from a distance a couple times over the years, one of his more reclusive neighbors even by Canadian standards.

Seth must've really startled it for it to not just come that close to a campsite but to not even manage to disguise its path in the slightest.

"Nature strikes back, huh?" Boone said, prodding at the bent aluminum tent pole with the toe of his boot. "Guess we had something coming, it's been like a year since the poison oak incident."

Seth winced, noticeable even through the hypervigilant set of his shoulders and tightness of his jaw, and in any other situation Ryan would've seen the story there and pushed for it. It was definitely not the time for that, though.

Ryan gnawed on his lower lip and tried to boot his brain into gear, to think faster and figure this out.

Even though he was well aware of what had happened, and most of why, and knew that it wasn't exactly going to be coming back, the adrenaline hadn't quite faded out of his system and he still felt jittery, was still trying to resolve the way he'd been so instantly concerned for both Seth and Ryan. And even though the elk was long gone, there was a lingering energy in the area that was unsettling him, and Ryan did not want to try and sleep there if it was going to keep feeling weird like that.

"Weren't you saying you wanted to check stuff out on the other side of the river?" Ryan asked. "We could probably just move camp there, set up fresh rather than trying to hang out here."

"Yeah, sure," Boone said sort of absently, still walking around the fallen tent, looking thoughtful. Ryan did not need him starting to think too hard about this, and shot Seth a look that said "Do something!"

Seth scowled at him and sighed, and that was unfortunately the exact moment that Boone looked up to make eye contact with him. Seth tried to wipe the look off his face, but Boone just said, "What?" bullishly.

"Nothing, it's fine," Seth said. "Uh, Ryan, how bout you pack up the other tent and me and Boone will get this one?"

Ryan winced. He probably couldn't blame Seth for wanting him to stay clear of Boone now that Seth knew there was something going on, and could start imagining all kinds of reasons for Ryan to be along on this trip with them.

He was pretty sure Seth knew he wasn't dangerous, at least, because the impression he'd gotten from that momentary glimpse of Seth with all his shields down had told him more than enough to know that Seth could look out for himself and Boone if he needed to.

Ryan held up both hands, placating. "I, yeah, sure."

"Wait, what's going on?" Boone said, still not dropping it, looking between the two of them. "Why are you guys being weird?"

"It's nothing," Seth gritted out, and Ryan didn't trust himself to speak.

"Hey, come on," Boone said. "Why are you being all over-protective, Jonesy, what the fuck?"

“I’m not,” Seth said, his tone clipped enough that the lie was obvious. “It just looked like Ryan wanted some space.”

“Wait, now you have a problem with him?” Boone said. “What happened to ‘it’s none of my business, just don’t mess around with the gear’?”

“It’s fine,” Ryan said, holding both hands up. No one needed him making this worse, and if Seth needed him to back off from Boone until he’d worked through his own instinctive response to this situation then he could do that.

“No, what the fuck, come on,” Boone said. “I’m not doing this horror movie no one communicating with each other bullshit, what is your problem?”

“Uh,” Ryan said, exchanging a look with Seth, and hoping he had a better idea. “Maybe I’ll go back and grab our stuff from the riverbank? So it doesn’t get blown into the water or whatever?”

It didn’t count as being a coward if he genuinely believed that Seth was in a better position to spin a story that Boone would buy, Ryan told himself. Unfortunately, Seth seemed to have the exact same idea he did, because he shoved the pile of gear in his hands at Boone and blurted out, “Actually, I’ll come with you, there’s too much for one person. And then we can finish packing up here.”

That wasn’t the worst idea, actually, Ryan thought.

He and Seth could exchange notes, figure out what the game plan was. And frankly, he wasn’t even sure what Seth was doing with Boone—keeping an eye on him and trying to stop him finding anything dangerous seemed like a safe assumption, but Ryan would rather know for sure.

"Good call," Ryan said, not breaking eye contact with Seth and trying to head this off before he could blow both of their covers. "It looks like the deer is long gone, so it should be safe enough to split up. I’ll leave Jake with you, eh, Boone?”

Ryan was pretty sure that the elk had been about as startled to see Seth as he was to run into them. Especially if they'd gotten a good enough look at him to figure out exactly what his deal was, which Ryan was still not really sure of at all. He’d only gotten the smallest glimpse before Seth had locked it all down again, projecting ‘everyday average human’ with all his might. And he was good, because he’d fooled Ryan for hours of close contact.

"Sure," Boone said slowly, looking between the two of them, suspicion clear on his open features, his inability to hide his feelings broadcasting that loud and clear.

"Right, c'mon, Murray," Seth said, and he stalked past Boone and grabbed Ryan's upper arm, dragging him along.

It might've looked like he was offering support on the uneven ground, but Ryan could feel his fingers biting in, and the unspoken message that if he didn't go along he was going to get dragged.

Ryan let him.

It was a silent scramble back to the river bank, cutting through the brush, and Ryan winced as he saw where they'd also trampled over a young sapling in their haste, slowing his steps long enough to try and mend what he could of it. He had a duty to the land here as well as to its creatures, and running around carelessly and causing unnecessary damage was not part of his usual habits.

Seth didn't say anything, but he did wait, though Ryan could feel the impatience and tension thrumming through him.

A minute later they were back at the river bank, and even though Ryan was well aware this was just a ploy so they could talk without Boone over-hearing them, he did stoop to start grabbing the towels they'd left, the various bits of gear they'd lugged down to the river in the first place.

He stepped warily around Seth as he did so, all his senses extended, not bothering to hide the fact he was trying to work out what Seth's story was as he did.

"You won't guess," Seth said after a minute, stuffing the tripod into his backpack and deflating the inner tube that Ryan had found in his own camping backpack, a leftover from a trip with his cousins. "If I was going to hurt either of you it would've happened by now, so stop looking like an angry cat."

Ryan huffed out a breath, and realized for the first time that he was—a lot hairier than he should be, around regular people. Although Seth definitely didn't qualify as that.

He tried to set aside the hum of uncertainty that was making his fur stand on end, swallowed the urge to yell or demand answers, and closed his eyes long enough to pull a much more ordinary looking guise back on.

"That's better," Seth said. "So you wanna tell me what the fuck your deal here is, huh?"

"What am I doing here?" Ryan repeated, now actually pissed about it. "I _live_ here. This is my _home_ , you're the ones swanning in from out of the province to poke around, so what the fuck do you think you're doing? And you can't tell me you didn't know about me till now."

Seth shrugged. "Wasn't sure exactly what was up with you until now. And not that it's any of your business—" at which point Ryan bristled some more, "I'm keeping an eye on Boone. He's got very good instincts, and it's important he doesn't get in over his head if he does find something."

Something about that didn't feel quite right to Ryan, but he wasn't sure exactly why.

"Oh, so you're his _babysitter_ ," Ryan said, trying to put a mean edge on his tone. "Good work spooking the were-elk right through the camp site then, that's real subtle. A 'deer'. Jesus, he knows what deer tracks should look like, and he's going to notice that those aren't them."

Seth shrugged. "You keep angry ghosts and a jealous lake monster away from a guy for a couple years, you get attached."

Ryan hummed, unsettled. "I'm not going to hurt him." He looked more pointedly at Seth. "Or you."

And he kind of thought Seth knew that too, deep down, or he'd never have agreed to let Ryan come along on this camping expedition. Never let him share his tent—his bed—with Boone. Not even if Seth was right there, keeping an ear on them. And—fuck, with the kind of senses that Ryan could tell Seth had been keeping under wraps, he had to have been able to hear _everything_.

Ryan was not going to fucking turn red again.

"I don't think you could anyway," Seth said calmly, and for a moment that caught in Ryan's throat, there was a heart-stopping sensation of an enormous presence; the weight dragging at the unnatural order of the world that Ryan had moved in as easily as breathing since he was born. The fastest eyelash flicker impression of wings blocking out the sun, curving around to lock them all away from the rest of the world, as Seth's eyes went even darker, and his teeth took on a silvery sheen.

Ryan wanted, desperately, to step back, but he was too stubborn to do it. Too stubborn to show his throat or bow his head.

Seth pulled that display of power back inside so quickly that it felt like the birdsong around them had gotten ten times louder, rushing in to fill the absence of sound. Ryan had never met anyone with that level of control. No wonder he hadn't realized Seth was something more than he looked until then.

"So why the little exhibition now, then?" Ryan asked, the implicit issue starting to clear up for him. Seth had no reason to show him all of this, not as far as Ryan could tell. "I don't hurt people, I just wanted to make sure you two didn't hurt anyone or anything out here, by accident or not."

Seth raised a brow, the tiniest smile pulling at the corner of his lips, and Ryan hated that there was an answering flare of heat in his stomach at that, that he could still find Seth attractive, even when he was threatening him. Even when he was doing _something_ with Boone that Boone didn't seem to know about.

…just like Ryan was, his brain helpfully informed him, and Ryan sighed gustily, folding up the lightweight camp chair he'd dumped his gear onto an hour ago, just for something to do with his hands.

"Look," Ryan said, turning back to Seth, figuring he might as well put all his cards on the table. It wasn't like he could do much of anything else. And there was something about the restrained trickle of power that Seth still had clenched behind his teeth that made Ryan suspect that Seth would be able to tell if he lied.

"Truly. I'll swear on whatever you need me to; I didn't know what he did when we first…met…and then once I did find out, I just wanted to protect him and everyone else who lives out here. That's all. No more than that."

Seth looked like he wanted to disbelieve him, but Ryan knew everything he'd said was the absolute truth, there was no reason not to believe it, and no way to suggest any other rationale.

He'd backed the words with enough of his own power that Seth had to know exactly what he was by then, even if the visual cues hadn't been enough. Ryan was back in his usual guise, visually at least, but the truth had to be chiming in Seth's ears, ringing along whatever senses he had to interpret and interact with the supernatural world.

Almost despite himself, Seth's grin grew. "You're kidding."

"I told you," Ryan said, open and empty palms outstretched. "No games, nothing hidden. This is exactly what it looks like, and if you don't want to believe it, then maybe you need to do some thinking about your own motivations."

Seth didn't like _that_.

The flinch—of guilt, if Ryan was any judge—was clear in his body language and his aura, but his own basic honesty seemed to mean he wasn't going to smack Ryan down for it, however much the sudden urge might have tempted him. Ryan very carefully did not smirk.

"I gotta say," Seth said after a moment. "This is the first time he's actually found what he was looking for, and not just something else that happens to be lurking in the area. Nice to meet one of your people," and he glanced significantly at Ryan's feet, a slow grin that seemed entirely cheerful taking over his face. "I take it you're the runt of the litter, then? Those look like size 11s that you're wearing."

Ryan sighed.

"'Bigfoot' is a misnomer applied by tourists and people who didn't know shit, and also when I'm trying not to scare the locals I like to look normal. Also, it's much easier to find Reeboks in this size, so excuse me for not living down to the stereotype. Why are you suddenly way less concerned about what I'm doing with your boy? I thought you figured this out the second we got back to the campsite."

"Not so much," Seth said. "I've met some of your, uh, relatives out in upstate New York, but all I could see or feel once you burst back through the brush was your intensity, and the, uh. Restrained violence."

That was probably fair, Ryan thought. He had been desperately concerned, racing back to the camp without knowing what was going on. And Seth was still talking.

"I've been trying to keep everything locked down while we're out here, since I really didn't expect that we'd find anything else supernatural, especially with the two of you all over each other. The sexual tension's practically visible from a mile away, and this is a low risk area, so the elk took me by surprise, too."

"They really don't get out much," Ryan offered, willing to give Seth the same benefit of the doubt that he was extending. "Like, even I only see them every couple of years, and they know to expect my folks in our territory. I'm not sure if it's the same person or their descendants, but we've got family journals going back decades that mention it, it just… gallops on through and occasionally startles some of the locals. It's been a while since anyone who wasn't already aware of the, uh, politics in the area saw it." He shrugged at Seth. "We're on good terms with the locals. Mostly we just keep on keeping on and don’t get in each other’s way. So, are you really from Texas?"

It was definitely none of Ryan's business, but he was wildly curious, and Seth had warmed up enough that maybe he'd actually answer.

Seth shrugged and gave him an inscrutable grin. "My branch of the family is. I'm a little older than I look."

"Didn't need to tell me that," Ryan muttered.

"No, but you could definitely tell _me_ what the fuck is going on," and Boone shoved his way out of one of the patches of scrub, shaking leaves out of his hair, pure determination written all over his face. "Like how you've both apparently been lying to me this whole damn time."

Ryan looked guiltily at Seth, and saw a mirror of his own startled shock, the horror at having effectively given themselves away past any kind of denial.

"There isn't any chance you know a way to make him forget the last thirty seconds, is there?" Ryan hissed. It wasn't a kind of spell or power he'd ever heard of, he didn't know of anything even close to that, but Seth was clearly better informed than he was, so maybe he would. Ryan didn't know how to get out of this situation without having to disclose _something_ , and every second that passed was going to make that worse.

"I've been listening for the last five minutes, I'm not stupid," Boone said, as Seth winced harder and said, "No, I don't. Not for five minutes or even thirty seconds. I try to get by on being a lot smarter than this, normally."

"Well, yeah, I'd sure hope so," Boone said, looking not nearly frightened enough for someone who'd witnessed Seth's uncloaked power a moment ago. "Weirdly enough, it was not subtle or convincing when you spent two days not giving a shit about what I did with Ryan and then dragged him off for a shovel talk five seconds after something that was not a deer flattened our campsite. Of course I was fucking suspicious."

"I mean, everything's fine now?" Seth tried, and this time it was Ryan's turn to wince. He'd only known Boone for like two days and even he knew that wasn't gonna work.

Boone stalked closer and got right up into Seth's personal space.

Ryan couldn't say he'd be doing that, but Boone was brave and, realistically, also didn't actually know enough about the supernatural to realize how scared he should be. Which was, in retrospect, probably exactly why Seth was apparently so committed to looking out for him. Shit.

"How many things have we found that you've—you've scared off, or distracted me from, or—fuck, last month when you said the camera broke! We really recorded something, didn't we? And you _deleted it_."

Boone was working up to a good head of steam, his face red and fists clenched, and Ryan almost felt sorry for Seth, who actually leaned away instinctively for a second before facing up to him.

"I didn't delete anything last month," Seth said, and all three of them could hear the loophole in that sentence. "I swear, the camera actually did break, there was nothing there. I might have dealt with some actually dangerous situations for you, but it's not my fault if lower order creatures don't care to approach us. And it keeps you safe."

"I don't want to be _safe_!" Boone yelled. "What the fuck is wrong with you? Did you get, like—like _assigned_ to me? Is there some fucking Men in Black agency that monitors this stuff, or are you part of a global conspiracy cover-up or—"

"God no," Seth said. "I actually took this job because I needed a job and I'm good at this stuff. Hauling your ass out of danger is just a side hustle that I don't even get hazard pay for." He scowled at Boone, but Ryan could see the fear underlying it. The tension that was probably not just because Boone had just had an up close and personal encounter with the supernatural, and it wasn't the kind that Seth could've saved him from. Or—

Ryan rocked back onto his heels and put all the pieces together for the first time. Shit, he should've—oh, this was awkward. And he really shouldn't be part of this. "Uh, maybe I'll just—" he said and tried to edge away.

Boone whirled around and pointed at him, his eyes flashing fire. "And _you_! You knew, too! Don't fucking walk away—I mean it, no one is hiking out of here alone, okay? Get that fucking through your skull, whatever you are."

His voice shook a bit on the end there, adrenaline starting to run out at last, and Boone chewed on his lip before looking Ryan in the eyes. God, Ryan hoped he wasn't freaking out after the fact about how they'd been sleeping together. "You are, aren't you? What he was hinting."

Ryan sighed.

"I'm from a family of cryptids, we have certain powers and abilities, and sometimes I look a little different, but the rumors about almost all of that are completely made up. Like, bullshit from dudes who got drunk and walked home and saw a wolverine or whatever. I don't eat people, I don't steal babies, and my feet are _perfectly normal_. And the full moon isn't involved in any way, shape, or form. Sorry. It's—you understand why none of us want to actually go around advertising the fact that we're different, right?"

He could hear the shake in his own voice, no matter how he tried to hide it. He hadn't meant to get this involved, but he actually did care what Boone thought of him, and he knew whatever his face was doing, his eyes were pleading with Boone to understand.

"So… bigfoot, eh?" Boone said, not picking up what Ryan was putting down at all.

Ryan was kind of annoyed he was still stuck on that part, and that made it easier to decide that he might as well be all in at that point, and if Boone found it startling, then he shouldn't call Ryan a name that Ryan had already said he didn't like using. So Ryan dropped his concentration and stopped telling himself to look and feel like any other dude out hiking with his bros. A thin fine pelt of hair sprang out all over his skin, his eyes darkened, nostrils flaring, shoulders and thighs and ribcage all getting more pronounced.

He didn't actually get taller—which he'd made his mom check several times as a teenager, disappointed to not get much further past six foot than he already was—but he knew he looked bigger, more solid. More threatening.

Boone made a muffled shrieking sound that Ryan secretly, deep down in the back of his mind found adorable, and Ryan blinked a few times to let his senses settle, before giving him a grin that involved a lot more teeth than it had five minutes ago.

Ryan cut a glance over to Seth, just to make sure he wasn't about to get swatted by something a helluva lot larger than he was, but Seth was leaning against a tree and looking bored, unconcerned by both Ryan's temper tantrum and Boone's yelling.

"Hi," Ryan said, letting his eyes flash reflective and dark, predator focused on prey. "Like I said. _Not_ that. Just keep calling me Ryan, will you?"

To give him credit, after that initial reaction, Boone looked a lot less freaked out and he hadn't tried to run, which probably was something Ryan should have been worrying more about.

He wasn't trying to sneak his camera or his phone out, either, which was the only reason that Ryan hadn't left in a huff and left the two of them to figure themselves out. He could probably get home in an hour or two if he actually wanted to; his stamina and foot speed were a lot higher in this form, even if he'd have had to slow down a little for Jake to keep up.

"Okay, Ryan," Boone said. "Sorry, I just—that was dumb of me, right. Sorry. Uh. I guess this means we're canning the trip now, huh?"

Seth straightened up from his lean. "I mean, we don't have to."

Boone raised an eyebrow, apparently a lot more comfortable giving Seth attitude than he was Ryan. Then again, even though he'd seen the same things Ryan did, Boone had known Seth a lot longer and denial was a very effective calming mechanism; he was probably talking himself down internally with every passing second and by the time they left, he could think that Seth was not a big deal, even though he was possibly one of the most impressive 'shifters that Ryan had ever met.

Ryan tucked away the little kernel of hurt at the idea of Boone and Seth leaving. He didn't get to feel bad about that, because he was never supposed to get attached. This had always had an expiry date.

"What do you mean?" Boone asked. "Like, I found—what I was looking for, and I do understand why it would be shitty to actually use any footage, so we should just, like. Pack up and go, right? And when we get home we can have a _conversation_ about the stuff you've been keeping away from me," and his gaze was pure determination as he pinned Seth with it, just as effectively as Seth had managed to get them all to freeze earlier.

Okay, so he learned quickly, Ryan thought.

Seth looked unmoved, but there was something in his eyes that Ryan found fascinating, the hint that he was about to roll over and metaphorically show his belly, to—to Boone, who had about the same amount of magical power and energy as the battered tilley hat he had jammed onto his head. Ryan might've been more shocked by that if he couldn't feel a whisper of the same urge himself. If he didn't kind of want to help Boone out, if he could do it without endangering anyone else.

"Well, we could set up some fixed cameras around camp tonight," Seth said slowly. "And if we all know exactly where they are, then we can probably arrange for something to get close enough that you'll get some footage, but nothing that'll be clear enough to cause any of us problems."

That was a terrible idea and Ryan shouldn't even entertain it, but he was tempted. Met Seth's eyes and nodded. Apparently he was just as much of a sucker for Boone's puppy dog eyes as Seth was.

"I—yeah, I can do that," Ryan said. "As long as I can look over the footage before you leave, just in case."

Boone sighed and Ryan could see him wrestling with it, with the knowledge that he prided himself on taking this seriously and not pulling bullshit on his viewers, but that he was going to come out of this trip with absolutely nothing but a list of excuses to take back to his production company otherwise.

"It's not faking footage," Seth said softly. "It'll be real. Real footage, of real, uh, cryptids, just—not as close as you'd like to get. Or as close as you've been," and he did something with his eyebrows then that reminded Ryan of exactly how Seth had acted the first day they'd met, joking about it and trying to make it very clear to Boone that he was cool with him picking up guys, so cool that he'd just give them both shit for it like they were any of his bros.

Ryan thought he could probably see how the edges of that little act were starting to crack and splinter now.

"You're right," Boone admitted, sagging a little. "I—yeah. Fuck. Thank you. Sorry." He turned back to Ryan again. "Sorry I yelled at you, too. I… appreciate you doing this."

"I mean," Ryan said with a shrug. "It's basically what I agreed to guide you for—making sure it's safe for you guys and for anyone out here. Also, the elk probably won't be back, it has a pretty big territory so, um, if you and Seth want to share the tent tonight you'll be perfectly safe."

Boone's chin came up and he nailed Ryan with that steady glare this time. Ryan got why Seth caved so fast, actually. Fuck.

"Why wouldn't you be sharing? Uh, unless that was just because—" he trailed off, looking uncertain, and Ryan could not, would not do _that_ to him.

"Hey," he said softly. "No, it's—I went home with you before I had any clue who you were, you know? I wasn't lying about any of that, you're, uh. Really hot, which I think you know, I was—" Ryan stumbled to a halt in mid-sentence, not sure how to phrase 'killing two birds with one stone' in any way that wasn't horribly insulting.

"Right, good," Boone said. Ryan wasn't sure he believed him. Ryan wasn't sure Boone believed _himself_ , there.

"Look, let's just get all our shit together and hike on to the other spot you told us about, Ryan," Seth said, taking the reins and getting them all moving again, however awkwardly. "We can talk some more on the way, and anything that gets too real can just get deleted, if anyone asks I'll say it was for music rights or whatever."

"Sounds good," Ryan said, and he followed the two of them back to their campsite, the camp chair slung over one shoulder, a couple of towels on the other.

Boone slowed his steps for Ryan to catch up, which was some comfort—he wasn't too intimidated by Ryan to be within grabbing reach of him, that had to be a good sign.

"Sorry for, uh, being intrusive and shit," Boone said. "You've been real good about this whole thing, really. Probably better than I can even tell now, I think."

Ryan shrugged. "It's fine." He wanted to say: I'm so fucking into you that I'd make worse choices faster if I had to, but it was probably better if Boone didn't know that. He'd think Ryan was a fucking weirdo and not just because he was a backwoods cryptid who didn't like being caught on camera even when he looked like a human.

"I swear I'm not being creepy," Boone said, and Ryan raised an eyebrow at him, grinned and gestured for him to go on. "But, uh, can I touch your arm?"

"Oh!" Ryan said, heat rushing to his cheeks. He'd almost forgotten he'd never pulled his human shape back on, and thank god Boone was still staring at his arms because hopefully that meant he wouldn't see him blushing. He'd been around family and some of the other groups out in the prairies like that, sure, but he'd never been 'shifted in front of a friend who wasn't also one of them, and he was a little shocked that Boone was taking it that well so far. "Yeah, uh, go ahead."

A few feet in front of them, Seth snorted, and muttered something that even Ryan's acute hearing couldn't quite make out.

Boone reached over, ran his fingertips down Ryan's forearm, elbow to wrist, and then back up again against the grain, ruffling his fur.

Ryan fought a shudder, he felt almost—ticklish? It was _nice_ to have Boone touching him like that; impressed and wondering and comfortable, something he'd never even imagined happening. He'd have expected some kind of reaction, or maybe for Boone to snatch his hand back once he really and truly realized what Ryan was, but Boone seemed to be taking it in stride.

"Soft," Boone said, and he ran a nail over the inside of Ryan's wrist. Ryan didn't manage to hide the shiver at all, but Boone was still looking down at where his hand—big, strong, and work-roughened—was on Ryan's arm, still not letting go of him. "And it's kind of… downy underneath?"

Ryan tried to find refuge in science, in being helpful without giving too many actual secrets away. "Yeah, I forget what the proper name for it is, but it's for waterproofing, like, um, otters. We stay warm even in winter, even if we're out on the river or under the ice."

He also had about four times the lung capacity a guy his size should, but he was a lot less sure about how that worked. Kind of hard to examine that kind of thing without needing volunteers who weren't going to be using their lungs ever again, and Ryan's family worked very, very hard to make sure no unexplained bodies ever surfaced where the human world might notice them.

"Oh cool," Boone said, and up ahead Seth snickered "Otters," with a meaningful emphasis that absolutely none of them missed.

Boone grabbed his water bottle from the side of his pack and aimed it at the back of Seth's neck, making him yelp and startle. "Like you don't go for exactly the same type," Boone said cheerfully, teasing with the comfort of long familiarity.

" _I_ have never dated a were-otter," Seth called over his shoulder.

"…wait, have I?" Boone asked, eyes widening and Seth managed to keep a poker face for about five seconds before losing it and laughing hysterically.

"Oh fuck, your face," Seth said, and turned around again just in time to duck under a low-hanging tree branch. Apparently his senses were just that good even when he was locked down enough that Ryan could be forgiven for mistaking him for an ordinary human after all. Some people got all the luck.

"I mean, you gotta admit he got you there," Ryan said.

He was almost enjoying the novelty of holding his natural shape with people around, and he probably shouldn't get too used to it, but… it was nice that Boone didn't seem to mind, and once Seth had gotten a better look at him he seemed fine as well. And that wasn't nothing. Although he definitely had to be careful not to slip up again the rest of the time they were in the woods, better to be safe than sorry when they were lugging so many cameras around.

After all, Ryan will still be living there by the time they went back to Toronto or wherever it was they were actually based.

And… fuck. Ryan had been sleeping with a guy when he didn't even know where he called home. Not exactly a banner week for any of them, possibly.

"Where do you guys live normally anyway?" Ryan asked, without stopping to think it through more. He went a little red as he realized that maybe Boone would jump to some conclusions about him asking that, but… then again, maybe Ryan would be okay with those conclusions.

"Dallas and the GTA, depending," Seth said, and Boone sped up and shoulder-checked him, hissing something that Ryan didn’t exert the extra effort to actually hear. He should give Boone some privacy where he could.

"Just outside of London is not the GTA," was what Boone said loud enough that Ryan was pretty sure he was meant to hear, though.

It felt like an olive branch of a kind, an opportunity for them to claw their way back to the easy conversation and teasing they'd had a day earlier, before anyone knew much of anything about the others.

Ryan took it.

"City boys," he called, and shook his head sadly, hiding the grin at the way that Boone swung around like he'd been magnetized to say, outraged, "I grew up on a _farm_."

"Mmm," Ryan said, not gracing that with a comment. Letting Boone dig a little.

"We met _you_ in a city, who are you calling a townie anyway," Boone added, with just the faintest hint of petulance in his tone.

"Hey, I spend most of my time out here, just saying."

"I dunno," Seth said, "I think Boone has a point. Anyway, uh, you might wanna—" and he gestured broadly, waving a hand up and down to gesture at Ryan's everything. "I want some footage of when we're breaking camp, just in case we need some b-roll, and there's already enough jokes on the internet about Boone being a werewolf, so."

"Right," Ryan said, and he focused hard, made himself look as close to normal again as he could. Let himself trust that if there was going to be an actual problem at any point then Seth could handle it just as well as he could, and probably he could actually relax a little for once.

"Oh, I—" Boone said, and then shut up fast. He looked a little—disappointed? That couldn't be right.

Ryan hadn't had a whole lot of people witness his changes who weren't already familiar with the process, but generally speaking they'd been relieved when he looked back to normal. He'd have thought Boone would be the same, however much he claimed to love the supernatural and weird shit.

They finished packing up when they got back to their camp site, and Ryan had to laugh as Jake bounded out from behind one of the trees, shaking himself vigorously and showering all of them with water all over again. "Some guard dog you are," Ryan told him, and even though he was pretty sure Jake wasn't any more self-aware than any other dog, it did feel a little like he was laughing at all of them.

That broke the awkwardness that had started to settle around them, and then Seth managed to crack a joke about Boone stumbling into the flattened tent himself like a blundering wildebeest that startled an involuntary laugh out of Ryan, who met Boone's eyes by accident before Boone cracked up as well. They closed the loop as Seth had to bite down hard on his lip to not laugh at the two of them looking like absolute clowns, and just like that, Seth's B-roll was mostly useless footage of two and then all three of them howling with laughter, taking a break to catch their breath and then setting each other off again.

Ryan wasn't all that sad about it; it kind of felt like they'd all needed it. And the less he was on camera the better, even if he now knew that Seth was just as invested as he was in making sure nothing incriminating wound up on camera.

The rest of their afternoon's hike was on the other side of the river, and Ryan dredged up some botanical information from the back of his mind—he knew what plants lived where, and what was edible and what to be wary of, but half the time he couldn't tell you what they were actually called—and talked Boone into adding some of the edible roots to their stew for dinner. He did insist on adding a lengthy disclaimer about being damn sure what you were eating before foraging, with Seth filming over his shoulder to look down into the pot as Ryan flicked slices off the end of the root with his knife, and angled it up again every now and then to catch Boone's expression whenever Ryan said something perfectly serious that made him laugh for some reason.

"What?" Ryan said the third or fourth time, not upset about it but slightly confused.

"Your deadpan," Boone said, shaking his head. "You're just so—you do that thing with your face, it's funny, okay?"

They got some good footage, made a few more jokes, and Seth sighed a lot but claimed they probably had enough for him and Boone to cut together, although Boone was gonna have to do some heavy lifting on the voice over for some of it.

Setting up camp for the second time in one day felt a little silly, but whatever combination of Ryan, Seth and the were-elk had made their first site feel so eerie and wrong to Ryan hadn’t moved with them.

He’d paused for a moment before tossing Boone’s sleeping bag into his tent with his own, just long enough for Boone to raise an eyebrow at him across the clearing and then nod, sharp and decisive. If Seth was noting that little byplay, he didn’t say anything about it, just finished building the fire up with the fallen wood they’d collected.

Ryan fed Jake, realized they were set up well enough by that point that there wasn’t really anything else he could do around the campsite, and managed to last about five minutes of sitting down before Seth raised an eyebrow at him and said, “Dude.”

“What?” Ryan tried not to sound pissy about it; it wasn’t Seth’s fault he was too fidgety to sit still or to do anything useful.

“You okay over there?” Seth asked, his tone guarded, and his eyes flicked to the side in a way that gave away the fact that he was asking for Boone’s sake. That he was putting himself in front of him to take the metaphorical hit if Ryan was going to be shitty about any of this now that they’d all had time to breathe and—mostly—calm down again.

Ryan opened his mouth, closed it again, sighed, and stood up. “I’ll be fine,” he said, and caught Boone’s eyes to add, “Really. I think I need a minute to, um, burn off some of this energy, you know?” Normally, if he felt that trapped in his own skin but couldn’t really change he’d go for a run, or chop some wood, do something physical to ground himself in the body he was in and tire himself out.

And he could still do something like that, he realized. He could trust that Seth would look out for Boone and just run; could take Jake with him and really work off the nervous energy still humming through him in the safest way possible. If that didn’t do the trick, he could change anyway, because he didn’t need to keep that secret from the two of them anymore. Ryan let that possibility hang in his mind for a moment, almost shaken with the enormity of it.

“I’ll be back in, like, half an hour,” he said, decision made, whistling for Jake to heel. “Really. I swear this isn’t some long game to abandon you in the middle of the woods or whatever.”

“You do know where we both sleep,” Boone said mildly, “So that isn’t exactly high on my list of things to worry about. Just go, we’ll have food by the time you get back.”

“Awesome,” and with embarrassingly obvious relief, Ryan abandoned them both to race Jake back in the direction of the river.

The physical exertion and the familiar scents and sounds of nature were doing exactly what he’d hoped to dull the last remaining jitters, calmed him down enough that he dropped back from a full-out run along the river bank to walk, watching the water tumble past and thinking hard.

Ryan had just enough trust in Boone and Seth to figure they weren’t going to go break their word about making sure there was plausible deniability in their show, and that should have been his primary concern. It should have been the only thing he was actually thinking about, but he kept picturing Boone that morning, trustingly curled up against him, and wondering if he’d destroyed whatever connection they’d been building till then.

And again: nothing he was going to figure out by guessing or worrying about it.

Abruptly tired of his own circular thinking, Ryan kicked off his shoes, shed his shirt and pants, and strode into the river, swimming out to the very middle of it. He let himself just fight the current for a while, long enough that even Jake had gotten tired of swimming circles around him and had trotted back to the shore with a new prize stick to play with. Ryan forced himself to keep swimming until he felt almost water-logged, until even his shoulders were burning and he felt like he might be tired enough to shut his mind off sufficiently to sleep later.

About the only conclusion Ryan had come to by the time he turned around and headed back to camp, following the sounds of Boone and Seth’s quiet conversation like a homing beacon, was that he couldn’t actually plan anything else until he’d had a chance to talk to Boone some more.

Until they had some privacy, to figure out how the rest of this little jaunt was going to go.

He hadn’t bothered putting more than shoes on to head back to camp, the rest of his clothing clutched in his hand, figuring that at least that’d cut down on the number of wet clothes he’d have to hang out overnight. An additional benefit he hadn’t foreseen was the chance to catch both Boone and Seth giving him appreciative looks as he called out a hello, although Boone was the only one who overtly gave him a head-to-toe look that suggested he wasn’t too shaken by the reveal of what Ryan really was. Seth covered his own look with a muffled cough and a renewed attention to the pan he had over the fire, but Ryan’s eyes were sharp enough to pick that quick glance up all the same.

Seth busied himself setting plates out, unwrapping knives and forks from the dish towel they were nestled in as Ryan had toweled himself off and with dignity ignored Seth's suggestion that he shake himself dry like Jake.

“That looks good.” Boone took the first plate as Seth dished up, and promptly handed it to Ryan, waiting almost patiently for the second and not sitting down until Seth had also grabbed his own.

“Yeah, thanks,” Ryan said, tearing into his share with renewed appetite, and only letting himself take a couple of covert looks at Boone as they ate in near silence. Boone looked fairly normal, or at least right in line with the baseline Ryan had seen since they’d met; just not quite as high energy as he usually was when they were actively filming rather than getting establishing shots and b-roll.

Boone was still quiet through cleaning up afterwards, handing Ryan utensils to dry off as Seth stretched out in one of the camp chairs and offered low-voiced commentary on their washing up skills. Boone did flip him off, but not nearly as emphatically as he would’ve done a day earlier. Then again, they’d all had a pretty fucking momentous day, and Boone was the only one who was also grappling with the effect of finding out that the supernatural did in fact actually for real exist, and the resulting tweaks to his world view. It was one thing to believe, and another thing for the universe to drop absolute proof in your lap. Or, Ryan thought, the corner of his lip twitching, into your bed.

That all flipped in a second the moment they were done with dinner, as Boone zipped up the pack all the cooking gear was stowed in and turned to Ryan and Seth.

“So, let’s get this show on the road. Ryan, you still cool with doing this?” There was sympathy in the twist of Boone’s mouth, but his eyes were steady and unwavering on Ryan’s as he nodded. No hesitation. He could give Boone this much, at least.

“We can do some test shots, let you sign off on them, and then film the whole sequence,” Seth said, also right back to business.

“You got it.” Ryan nodded, and then ducked behind a tree to get some privacy to turn himself less-human looking again.

He wasn't sure why that seemed more uncomfortable to do with an audience when half that audience had been literally inside him, but Boone didn't seem concerned, so Ryan resolved not to worry too much about it either.

Seth finished setting up a couple of cameras, checked with Ryan about where he’d need to stand to be in frame but not fully visible, and then loped over to the campfire to build it up some more, the flames flickering inside the double ring of stones. That was technically overkill, considering it was barely twilight, but it looked picturesque as hell and Seth had assured Ryan it would also make him harder to see by fucking up the light balance.

"I knew I was right about that the other week," Boone grumbled, but it seemed to be mostly for show.

Seth counted them in, set the cameras all recording and then sat back down beside the fire, poking at it with a stick and producing a bag of marshmallows from somewhere Ryan hadn’t seen them. He was a little jealous, actually, and the smirk Seth was wearing suggested that he had broken them out then entirely on purpose.

Boone snitched one from the bag before Seth could offer, popping it into his mouth without even bothering to toast it first, and Ryan got distracted for a split-second, taking in the generous curve of his mouth, the way he licked the last bit of sticky sugar off his lip and then swallowed.

Ryan watched his throat move and had some decidedly not PG-rated thoughts about that, until Boone slid into Show Mode, his voice slow and even, making sure the cameras could pick up every word. Ryan shifted his weight from one foot to the other, and wished that his vague nerves would settle, or at least stop him from feeling kind of itchy all over.

Boone tossed a handful of twigs into the fire to make it flare up dramatically and grinned as Seth gave an exaggerated eye-roll in his direction, before saying "What? It's for atmosphere."

Seth sighed, and poked Boone in the biceps with the piece of wood he’d been using to toast his marshmallow before telling him to stop being a jerk. That little byplay was common enough that Ryan had almost been able to script it word-for-word from the audience; a bit that they did almost everywhere when they were sitting down long enough to get bored and start messing with each other while Boone waited for ghosts and monsters to show up, and Seth lied beautifully and with perfect composure about how that was never going to happen.

Boone leaned into Seth and started teasing him about his cooking skills—another running bit, apparently, from the ease they both delivered their friendly insults with, and one that was wholly untrue considering Ryan had eaten more than a little of Seth's cooking so far and approved entirely. Then again, the YouTube comments section clearly had no way of fact-checking _that_.

"Oh, did Ryan crash for the night already?" Boone asked, natural enough that even Ryan would have believed him. That was his cue, and Ryan called from behind the trees, in line with the tent, "Not with the way you two keep yelling about it," establishing at least a weak alibi.

He drifted part way around the clearing and came just into view of the first camera, not making any noise, just keeping himself a blur of motion.

Seth and Boone were still talking, but the pauses between their words were getting longer, and Ryan faded back into the woods and circled round some more. This time, he was careful to step directly on one of the dry pieces of kindling that they'd set out for this reason, and it snapped with a loud crack.

Boone startled and Ryan grinned to himself. That hadn't been acting.

"What was that?" Boone hissed, and Ryan opened his eyes wider, let the firelight catch and reflect in the corner of the shot for one of the other cameras. His height would make it hard for Seth as designated skeptic to argue later that it had been a small animal, and the lack of footprints was going to be his proof it hadn't just been a deer or something. Ryan waited a second, like he was caught himself, and then right as Boone got to his feet and started to turn towards him, he spun around and pelted off through the woods, making no attempt whatsoever at stealth.

"Holy fuck!" Boone yelled, and sprinted after him, and if the curse that followed was any indication, his night-blindness after looking right at the fire had meant he'd run face first into a low branch that Ryan had ducked around.

Ryan circled back significantly more quietly and pulled his guise back on, slithering under the far side of the tent and then emerging from the flies of it, rubbing his eyes theatrically and half stumbling into his hiking boots. He thought that was a nice touch.

"What the heck happened?" Ryan asked.

Seth pointed. "We heard a weird noise, so Boone—"

"Right," Ryan said, and jogged after him.

He found Boone a hundred meters or so away, leaning against a tree and not even breathing hard, the little LED on the front of his GoPro blinking through the trees at him.

Ryan slowed his steps, put on a friendly smile. "You find another deer out here, eh, Boone?"

"Oh, I don't know," Boone said. "It got away pretty fast, but there's no deer tracks or anything, and I can't hear it anymore. I guess Bigfoot got away clean."

Ryan nearly rolled his eyes but then realized he wasn't sure if there was enough light for the camera to pick that up, so went with a skeptical "Uh huh," instead.

"C'mon, we should go back and make sure Jonesy didn't get eaten by a river monster or something," Boone said cheerfully, striding to meet Ryan.

As he walked, Boone reached up and did something to the camera, and the little light winked out. Ryan raised an eyebrow. He was pretty sure Boone could see him, at least.

"Now," Boone said, "I think I said something about getting my hands on a cryptid?"

Ryan inhaled sharply.

And let Boone walk closer and closer, until he was right in Ryan's face. Until he was pushing Ryan back, slow careful steps until he was pressed right up against a tree, the bark rough against his elbows, against his back through his shirt. Boone's eyes huge and fixed on his, rising heat in his expression.

"I guess you should keep your promises then," Ryan said, his voice steadier than he quite felt.

Boone leaned in, kissed him hard, and started tugging at Ryan's waistband.

"Is this—?" he asked, pausing for maybe a split-second, but Ryan was already nodding furiously, his own hands diving under Boone's shirt, up to trace out the curve of his shoulder blades, holding him tight and desperately close.

"Good," Boone said, and then his mouth was crushed against Ryan's again, and they were kissing, open-mouthed and frantic, gasping against each other. Ryan was waiting for the moment it would all fall apart; for Boone to remember exactly where he was putting his hands and his mouth and his dick, and Ryan wouldn't exactly blame him if he had second-thoughts about it.

But instead of that, Boone's hand was on Ryan's dick, no hesitation, like nothing had changed since the last time they'd done this except now Boone knew, and... he still wanted Ryan.

Ryan was never going to take that kind of flexibility for granted.

He ran his hands down Boone's back, groped his ass shamelessly and made encouraging noises when Boone's hips jerked forward. Made more of them when Boone tried to rub off against him as Boone's own hands slowed and stuttered, overwhelmed.

It was fast and messy, and Ryan was pretty sure neither of them had cleaned up well enough to pass inspection by anyone, let alone someone with Seth's heightened senses, but he was too giddy to care, too high on having this to do anything more dignified than wave a quick goodnight in Seth's direction as they finally dragged themselves back to the campsite, and straight into their own tent and hopefully sometime after they’d both recovered enough, a round two.

* * *

Ryan lay there with his eyes half-open, running his hand slowly up and down Boone’s spine as they cooled off, not quite ready to surrender to sleep yet. It still felt like things were a little unfinished between then, not that Ryan needed much of a reminder that sex wasn’t actually a substitute for a conversation, however eloquently Boone could speak with his actions.

And—that was it, wasn’t it? Boone had been treating him the same all afternoon, the same as he had when they’d first met, and Ryan was desperately grateful and more than a little afraid that if he tried to talk about that, or anything else he might want, that it’d all pop like a soap bubble. Like a temporary illusion of the kind of normal life Ryan had never thought he’d get even a taste of.

It felt like that was something Ryan should at least mark, whether or not it held for the rest of the time they’d be spending together. He couldn’t deny that he was getting something out of this weekend too, even if it was something a little less concrete than what Boone was.

Honesty seemed like the best policy, and Ryan took a deep breath, ready to expose himself all over again.

"I'm so fucking glad my whole …thing… wasn't a deal breaker for you," he said at last, voice soft in the evening air.

Boone kind of choked and Ryan wasn’t not dumb; that was a Reaction with a capital R, and Boone sort of looked down at his hands, chin ducked down so Ryan couldn’t see his eyes.

“Boone?”

"This sounds bad, okay," Boone said, reluctance clear in his tone, and Ryan was a little sharper with his "What?" before Boone confessed, "It's kind of. The opposite of that?"

"Huh?" Ryan said, kind of lost.

"It's not a deal breaker," Boone repeated. "It's, um. Hot. That you are—that you can look like that, or that you could probably push me around some, if you wanted to. You're like. Super fucking attractive both ways you look," and Ryan just blinked at him, completely floored because that was definitely not something _anyone_ had ever told him before.

"Sorry," Boone said in a rush, "Like I know that sounds kind of like, uh, that's why I'm into you, and it's not—it's not the only reason, it just. Helps."

"Oh," Ryan said. "Huh."

"So anyway—" Boone said, trying to change the subject, but Ryan wasn't letting go that easily.

"You want me to, like, hold you down or whatever?"

Boone's heart-rate jumped, and Ryan was definitely cheating by letting himself notice that, but he couldn't help it.

"Uh, that would be. I mean, I'd be into it. If you want."

"So, yes," Ryan clarified.

He rolled onto Boone again, letting his weight settle evenly all over him, skin-on-skin, slick with sweat and come and kind of still dirty everywhere else just from the cumulative events of the day.

It made it easier in some ways to tap into the instincts that were always right under the surface, ready to rise up and take him over, to lead him headlong into a wilder place.

And if Boone wanted to tangle with that, then Ryan wasn’t going to say no to him. He was going to ease him into it, though. Ryan had more than enough control for that.

Ryan let his eyes get dark, pupils expanding as the tent lit up around him like there was a full moon instead of the last lingering moments of twilight filtering through the canvas. He could see every tiny detail of Boone's face, could see his chest rising and falling rapidly, could see the way his eyes got wider and his lips twitched as Ryan's face changed, as he became clearly and indisputably Other.

Could feel the way Boone's dick twitched against his stomach, his whole body getting in on the anticipation.

"Oh," Ryan said again. "Wait. You're not just into this, you're… _into_ it."

Boone sighed, and tried to reach for a joke, a distraction technique that Ryan had already clocked him on and god, had it only been, like, 72 hours since they'd met? "Oh baby, oh baby, fuck me with your monster cock?"

"If you call me daddy I'm gonna laugh," Ryan warned him. "Just. FYI. Not my kink."

"Noted," Boone said. "You really should fuck me, though. Because that is. Mine."

"Fuck," Ryan said intensely, and leaned in to kiss Boone fast while the echoes of that rolled through his whole body. God, he wanted to.

"Also, uh, if it's, um, insensitive or not possible or whatever though then that's cool," Boone said, and Ryan stopped cold in his mental cataloguing of the contents of his pack in an attempt to remember where he'd stashed lube, because he definitely remembered packing it.

"I'm sorry?" Ryan said.

Boone was definitely slowly going a dull red, blood rushing to his face and his chest and his dick. Fuck, he smelled good, and Ryan couldn't not notice that when he was in-between himself like this, not quite one or the other.

"I mean—If you wanna do it. While you're all, uh, like that," Boone said, and Ryan was going to need to give him some better descriptions soon, especially since neither of them was going to be able to say 'furry' without being aware of the other connotations, but—

Well that was just semantics, because Boone was looking at Ryan, who he'd seen go full cryptid, and still wanted him. Maybe wanted him more, and Ryan was…

More okay with that than he'd ever have expected.

"I hope this isn't like some size queen thing or something," Ryan said, mostly joking but a little serious all the same. "Like, my dick doesn't get three times bigger when I look like that or anything."

"Got it, all good," Boone said, his fingers digging into Ryan's sides as he squirmed underneath him, trying to rub his whole body up against Ryan's.

"It does get some bigger, though," Ryan added, also truthfully, and Boone's reaction did not disappoint.

Ryan reached for the lube while he still had fine motor control.

He dropped the bottle beside the foam mattress and ran a hand down Boone's side, appreciating the warmth of Boone's skin against his. And he enjoyed the way that Boone shuddered and tried to arch up, barely above to move with Ryan lying heavy and so hot on top of him, all that hair and down trapping the heat between them.

Boone just kissed him hard, didn't seem to mind at all that Ryan's teeth were sharper like that, ran his tongue over them, daring; nearly cutting himself, and Ryan was somewhere in the uneven ground between confused and concerned and turned on, and it was a fucking weird combination but it felt so good.

Felt even better when Boone ran his hands all over Ryan's body, when he dragged his nails over Ryan's ass, something that'd leave red marks scored into his skin normally, but like that it just felt like being petted, made Ryan want to roll over and show his belly and let Boone do anything he wanted if he’d just keep touching Ryan.

And fuck, he didn't stop.

Boone got him to roll them, so Ryan was on his back, knocking against the side of the tent and pulling it out of shape until they could shuffle back on top of the sleeping bag properly. Boone didn't hesitate for another second before curling a hand around Ryan's dick, grunting satisfaction as Ryan twitched in his hand. Boone sat up, hair brushing the canvas roof, his eyes fixed on Ryan’s, the air in the tent still and hot with anticipation. Boone wriggled into position, slinging a leg over Ryan's thighs to settle himself there, arm twisted to keep stroking him all the way to aching hardness, till Ryan was leaking steadily and almost growling, half out of his mind at how good it felt.

He was so much more sensitive in this form, all his nerves feeling like they were exposed and open, and every touch of Boone's hand made him want to howl in joy. And Boone was just—so fucking into it, eyes huge, breathing fast, squirming over top of Ryan, but he pushed Ryan's hand away when Ryan tried to return the favour, and before Ryan could even consider that any kind of rejection he gritted out, "I can't, it's—fuck, if you touch me now it'll be over in ten seconds and I want—" he trailed off, before reaching over Ryan's shoulder.

Thank god Ryan had no shame, and had thought ahead enough for all of that, because it took him about three seconds to find the lube where Ryan had dropped it, and about another twenty seconds to squirt some onto his fingers before twisting around to start fingering himself.

Ryan nearly whited out with overwhelmed arousal at that: feeling it and hearing it and smelling it, only able to see the way Boone’s muscles tensed and the way he shook at his own touch but well able to imagine everything he couldn’t see.

Before he could embarrass himself, Boone knelt up and guided himself down onto Ryan's dick, a slow steady slide that made Ryan think for a wild second that he was going to give Boone a two-for-one and prove spontaneous human combustion as well. Boone was so hot around him, felt so good, and was so very clearly hot for it that Ryan was getting in on that feedback loop with him; getting more turned on as Boone shuddered and moaned and clenched down on him, sinking all the way down and letting his head fall back as he panted.

Boone rode him slow and deliberately, and Ryan talked a good game about self-control but he had absolutely none left, fell apart completely as Boone fucked himself on his dick, and Ryan grabbed frantically at his hips, holding him exactly how he wanted him for a couple of wild seconds as he chased his own orgasm.

Ryan came and Boone made even better noises than he already had been, groaning as Ryan softened inside him. He grabbed desperately at his own dick then, and Ryan thought maybe he was going to try and stop himself, to hold out until Ryan had caught his breath, but it turned out that Boone could only deal with about five seconds of Ryan's palm joining his on his dick before he was coming with a shout.

Boone slumped onto Ryan’s chest and just breathed hard for a solid five minutes, but before Ryan could muster his courage to check he was actually okay—that had been fucking intense—Boone murmured a muzzy "Fuck, that was good," and rolled off him carefully, landing heavily on his back and staring skywards before turning his head to look at Ryan. "Holy shit, that was amazing. I think I'm ruined. No one else is gonna be able to top that. Fuck."

"Thanks?" Ryan said, a little uncertain, and Boone reached over to kiss him, slow and lingering, just the same as he had the first night they'd hooked up, and that helped Ryan to relax a little more.

"You're welcome," Boone said. "Like, extremely welcome, please fuck me any time you want to, wow."

Ryan couldn't help but grin at that. It was nice to be appreciated. "I had fun too," he said mildly, and laughed when Boone tried to punch him in the arm but was so floppy-limbed that it just turned into patting the short fur over his shoulder instead

"You're so soft," Boone mumbled. "I just want to rub my whole body over you—oh, whoops."

"Huh?" Ryan said, and then Boone rolled away from him and Ryan looked down to see—well. Boone had certainly gotten him just as dirty as Ryan could have ever hoped.

"Aw shit," Ryan said, "that's going to suck to try and get out."

Boone squinted at him, brain already whirring back to top speed. "If you went back to, uh, the everyday look would it vanish with the fur?"

"There are limits to science," Ryan tried to say with dignity, before sighing and adding, "and no, it'd just be on my skin instead. Well. And hair." Boone reached down to cup his dick with proprietary pleasure, fingertips stroking along his shaft, and fuck, Ryan was more sensitive after he'd come, and he was more sensitive in this form full stop, which meant that Boone touching him right then was exquisitely good, bordering right on pain.  
He whimpered, and Boone slid his fingertips from root to tip a second time, just to get the sound out of him, before raising his palm to his mouth and sucking his fingers clean.

"Holy shit, I'm gonna die from sex," Ryan said, suddenly kind of okay with that idea. Boone was so fucking hot.

"You have, like, supernatural stamina and shit, right?" Boone asked, still touching Ryan's dick, and Ryan gritted his teeth and said, "Kind of?" but it turned into a helpless moaning noise because fuck, Boone's hands were too effective and his enthusiasm was intoxicating, clear in the way he dug his thumbs into Ryan's muscle and scraped his nails down his pelt, and the way he seemed to not only be okay with but thoroughly fucking enjoying the sensation of Ryan's entire body rubbing against his.

"I bet this is even better in winter," Boone said, running his fingertips over Ryan's back, up and down, brushing the fur the wrong way and laughing when Ryan indignantly pointed out that he wasn't a _cat_ , thank you.

"I never get cold," Ryan said with a shrug.

"You could keep me warm," Boone said with a leer, and wriggled pointedly.

Ryan licked over the side of his throat and dragged his teeth down gently, enjoying the way that made Boone shiver even harder. "Gladly."

"Are you seriously getting hard again already?" Boone asked, his hand sliding between them, running familiarly along the length of Ryan's dick, tracing out the shape of him in a manner that Ryan could only describe as proprietary.

"Fast metabolism, everything else is pretty quick too," Ryan explained, mouthing over Boone's collarbone. "It's okay, you shouldn't feel like you gotta pay atten—" and he cut that off with a strangled groan as Boone squirmed just enough to line Ryan up with him, the head of Ryan's dick easily pushing back inside where he was still wet and open.

" _Fuck_ ," Ryan said, wide-eyed.

"I like your regular dick too," Boone said, "But this is—uh— _fuck_ ," and in any other circumstances his sincerity might've been sweet, but as it was Ryan felt kind of like he was going to catch on fire from being this turned on for this long, even if he had gotten to come already.

Ryan took the obvious hint there anyway, and thrust deeper into him, loving the way Boone moved with him, the way his body yielded and gave, the way all kinds of delicious noises were coming out of Boone's mouth, clearly beyond his conscious control as Ryan fucked him deep and hard and past the point of coherency.

"You think you can come again too?" Ryan asked, more for the way that it made Boone shake under him, his skin pink all over from where Ryan's hair rasped against him, like an all-over beard burn.

Ryan was not going to think too hard about just how much _that_ was doing it for him, thank you very much.

Boone mumbled something that didn't even sound like real words, but his hands were clenched tight on Ryan all the same, tiny little pinpricks of sensation where the hair was caught and pulling, like he was trying to get Ryan so deep inside him that there wouldn't be any room between them anymore.

Ryan couldn't say he was exactly opposed to the notion.

Possessiveness and lust got all tangled up together, going to Ryan's head like he was drunk on it, and that was enough to tip him over the edge as he came, letting Boone swallow the sounds he wanted to make as they kissed desperately. He tasted blood for just a second, his teeth catching on Boone's tongue, and Boone didn't even pretend to pull away, shuddering around Ryan and coming himself, body jerking in a way that had to be bordering on pain.

Ryan filed that away in his rapidly growing mental list of things that got Boone hot and bothered and tried very hard not to let himself remember they'd be closing that book at some point soon. They still had some time, dammit.

"This was already dirty, right?" Boone said, grabbing the closest t-shirt and making a desultory effort at wiping himself off with it before Ryan could even reply.

"It is now," Ryan muttered, but he pressed another kiss to the corner of Boone's mouth anyway, and then grabbed the shirt off him to carefully wipe himself down.

There was almost definitely no way either of them would look fit for human consumption without a more careful clean-up job, but it was late and getting dark and finally cooling off, and Ryan had no desire to go outside of the tent again to remind himself that some of the mosquitoes did like cryptid just as much as they liked human. Not if he didn't have to.

They shifted conversational topics after that by silent mutual assent; just slowly sharing stories about their families, their friends, and Ryan couldn't deny it was nice to be able to talk about his own childhood and family stories without having to edit for his audience so much. Boone was an appreciative listener, laughed in all the right places, and met Ryan's careful anecdotes with a couple eyebrow-raising farm stories of his own.

"This is nice," Ryan said after a moment, starting to feel sleep tugging at his consciousness and not quite ready to let go of the day yet. It had been pretty fucking eventful, after all, and he was still kind of processing.

"You're a sap," Boone said quietly, but with a soft enough look on his face that Ryan could tell he didn't mean it in a bad way.

Ryan shrugged.

"Thanks for, uh, not freaking out anywhere near as much as anyone else would've," Ryan said after another beat of silence. Boone's fairly easy acceptance had been eye-opening, in a lot of ways.

Boone kissed him again, sweet and lingering, and fuck, that was exactly how he could take Ryan to pieces, and he wouldn't even be doing it on purpose. Ryan closed his eyes and tried to let his mind empty, and then Boone pulled away and spoke again, his voice low enough that even Ryan could only just pick out the words.

"Thank you for not running screaming from this whole situation," Boone said. He quirked a grin at Ryan, eyes steady on his. "I, uh. Do get how you might've wanted to."

"What can I say, you're good in bed," Ryan replied immediately, and then wondered if that had possibly been too flippant. Boone laughed, so it seemed not.

"Right back atcha," Boone said, and he wriggled closer to Ryan, apparently compelled to try and be the big spoon even when Ryan looked like an escapee from a science fiction movie. "Fuck, I'm gonna fall asleep on you in a second. Pick this up in the morning?"

"Yeah," Ryan agreed, and he closed his eyes and let himself finally wind down for the day.

* * *

Ryan woke up with the dawn, and then shamelessly let himself fall right back asleep again, with nowhere pressing to be all that early. If it was self-indulgent to let himself enjoy being tangled up with Boone one last time, well. He wasn't a monk and he'd never seen the sense in denying himself needlessly.

Boone woke up slowly, starting to stir before his eyes opened, and Ryan kept his closed just to wait and see what he was going to do. The answer to that turned out to be: try to bury his head under the pillow and then into Ryan's shoulder, and Ryan had to laugh to himself as Boone made grumpy noises at finding Ryan significantly less cuddly than he'd been the night before.

"You don't have to," he said quietly, the words muffled with his face mashed into Ryan's upper arm, but Ryan understood what he was getting at and shrugged—gently enough not to knock him away.

"Hey, I do look like this most of the time," Ryan pointed out.

"You don't have to if you don't want to, though," Boone said stubbornly.

Ryan couldn't quite tell how much of that was a well-intentioned gesture of support and how much was self-interested kinking on it, but he found he didn't mind all that much either way. Boone was definitely dangerous for him, and not just because of his platform, he thought with a carefully hidden huff of ironic amusement.

"You'll be the first to know when I want to… let my hair down," Ryan said, and Boone laughed that time, and then sat up, stretching his arms over his head, the sleeping bag pooling down around his lap. Ryan's eyes moved downward and kept going, looking appreciatively until Boone laughed and rolled over to sprawl on top of him, shifting in a very deliberate manner. Ryan couldn't have missed the fact that neither of them had bothered with pajamas the night before, in the end, and now it was even more obvious.

Extremely… close to hand information, he thought, and then let Boone tempt him into waking up very slowly and enjoyably indeed.

* * *

The part where they both needed to clean up some before anyone wound up on camera was still a factor by the time Ryan and Boone dragged themselves out of the tent for breakfast, and Boone went so far as to stick just his head out of the tent to get the lay of the land first, while Ryan sat digging through his bag for a change of clothes and laughing at him.

"Dunno where Jonesy is," Boone said. "You want coffee first or to go back down to the river to wash up?"

"Coffee," Ryan said, not even needing to think about it. The cold water would feel good, but it'd been a long enough day yesterday—and a late enough night—that he wanted the boost from the caffeine first.

"Amen to that," Boone said, and set to making it on the little camp stove they'd stashed away.

Ryan was halfway through his mug when he could sense Seth approaching, moving through the woods but making just enough noise that Ryan could pick him out easily even if he didn't try too hard.

Ryan jerked his chin in that direction and gave Boone a significant look. Boone was further through his coffee than Ryan was so it didn't take him long to twig; he just raised an eyebrow and mouthed "Seth?" as Ryan nodded.

"Oh good, you're up," Seth said as he came into view, hands in his pockets and radiating the impression of having been up for hours already.

"Coffee?" Boone said, and then a little more quietly, "Uh, sorry if we, um, scared you off earlier."

Seth gave him a guarded look, but appeared to decide to take that at face value. "It's fine. I just had to be… somewhere else for a bit." His grin developed a little bit of an edge. "I'm sure you two crazy kids had fun, eh?"

"You're younger than me," Boone complained, "and you're not even Canadian."

"Oh, sorry," Seth said with emphasis, "Didn't realize you guys had the monopoly on that one."

Boone snorted, and didn't grace that with a response.

He did reach out to clasp Seth's shoulder as he came over to grab his own mug of coffee and said, much more simply, "Hey, um. Really. Thanks for dealing with all of this," and Seth gave him a look which Ryan was pretty sure was the mirror of the one that'd been on his face five minutes ago as he just said, softly, "Any time, man."

They were slow to get moving after that, deciding to just pack up their campsite before starting to work their way back to the trailhead.

Seth and Boone had had a low-voiced conversation while Ryan stowed the tent in its bag that had resulted in a decision to not try to film any more footage on the way out, figuring that they had more than enough for the episode that was taking shape in their collective vision.

“Besides,” Seth said, not unkindly, “This morning you kind of look like you’ve been mauled, and people would _notice_.”

Boone smirked, but his ears were very pink as he shrugged and went back to finish getting his own gear together.

Ryan had enough of a handle on what the other two could manage by then that he made the decision to take them cross-country rather than sticking to the trail. It'd save them at least an hour, and there was no way they'd get lost with him, so everyone won.

The voice in the back of his head pointing out that it would be an hour less to spend with Boone was getting thoroughly ignored. That went in the 'problems for future Ryan' box, and dwelling on it then and there wasn't going to help anyone.

Ryan whistled for Jake to heel and set out.

* * *

Ryan was expecting that once they got back into town, that'd be it.

He'd drop them at their hotel, head home, toss a bunch of his clothing into the washing machine and then spend a couple weeks—maybe months, he didn't know what the turnaround time on this stuff was—worrying that he'd fucked up and something identifiable would be on camera, but mostly he was just expecting to go back to his normal life.

That plan fell apart about three miles out of town, when Boone turned to him and said, very seriously, "So, can we get dinner somewhere tonight?"

"Uh, yeah, what kind of food were you guys thinking?"

Boone gave him a significant look that Ryan definitely should not have been looking away from the road long enough to clock, and Seth cleared his throat and then made an exaggerated performance of turning to look out the window to stare at the elevated railway tracks like they were the most fascinating thing he'd ever seen.

"Dinner as in, you let me take you somewhere nice," Boone said, and Ryan had caught up with the implication by then, felt his heart-rate kick up.

"Oh, uh. Yeah. Sure," Ryan said, knowing he was failing hard at playing it cool and not sure he cared. He shot Boone a quick look. "If you're sure."

"Yeah, I think it's the least I can do," Boone said. "Besides, I gotta show you I've got more than one move."

Ryan, with vivid memories of that morning, murmured, "Well, two, at least," and Boone's smirk took over his whole face.

Seth just sighed. "And I need to catch up on sleep, so you'd be doing me a favor too if you, uh, find somewhere else to spend the night."

"I guess we can probably work something out," Ryan said, and in the back of the truck, Jake barked at—Ryan wasn't sure what.

* * *

Somehow, looking at Boone—clean-shaven and dressed more nicely than Ryan had ever seen him—from across the table at one of Ryan's favorite restaurants was the most awkward Ryan had felt all weekend.

Boone fiddled with his knife and fork, picked them up, shifted them to the other side of his plate and then moved them back again.

"They're not going to bite," Ryan said, only just winning the fight with himself not to do the exact same thing. He didn't tend to handle feeling out of place any better than Boone seemed to.

"Yeah, I'd rather you do that," Boone joked automatically, but his heart wasn't really in it, and Ryan braced himself again to get let down kindly instead of quickly.

"Only if you ask nicely," Ryan said, though, because there were rules for this kind of conversation and Ryan was going to follow them if only because he didn't know what else to do. It wasn't dumb flirting so much as it was—well, he wasn't sure what.

"I'll keep that in mind," Boone said, and picked up his water glass. Finished that, and then his wine glass.

Ryan raised an eyebrow.

Boone sighed.

"Look, I'm shit at this part, okay," he said, and Ryan set his jaw and breathed in slowly and told himself he wasn't that upset, how could he be, he'd known Boone for like three and a half days. Come on, Murray. Get it together. "This was good, right?" Boone said, and Ryan blinked at him.

"Yeah?"

He didn't mean it to come out like a question; it had been good, even with all the—optional extras that had come along to complicate matters. And it wasn't like Ryan had ever fucked anyone else when he'd been… like that… and part of him was still trying to work out exactly how he felt about that, other than 'turned on about it and trying not to look like it in public' when he was thinking about it, anyhow.

"Yeah, for me too." Boone was blushing now, and Ryan definitely liked how that looked on him. "Not just, uh, the—"

"Bit we won't mention here?" Ryan suggested. He really did have to come up with some better euphemisms for being around other people, which wasn't exactly a problem he'd had before either.

"Yeah, that," Boone said. "That doesn't hurt, but it's not why, and, uh. I just wanted to say that, um, I know not everyone is up for dealing with distance, but I get the feeling you're pretty self-reliant most of the time anyway, and so maybe—?"

Ryan just stared at him for a long moment, trying to wrap his head around what Boone was saying, and what Boone wasn't saying, and more importantly what he _meant_.

Boone took pity on him and got more explicit.

"I really like spending time with you. And I think we work together pretty well, so, uh, if you don't mind me visiting every now and then, or dragging you off to possibly haunted B&Bs in the middle of America or Canada whenever our schedules match up, then I'd kind of like—"

"Yes," Ryan blurted out, without even thinking it through.

Boone beamed at him. "I know we really only just met, but—"

"Yeah, it's been a pretty eventful couple of days, hasn't it?"

Boone snorted. "You said it."

"So, uh, how much longer do you have in town before you guys have to head out anyway?" Ryan hadn't liked to ask, before. It had felt too intrusive, like he was asking for information he didn't necessarily have the right to. And now, dizzyingly, it wasn't just part of his business, but something he was entitled to ask. Expected to.

It was kind of making him giddy.

"We leave tomorrow," Boone said, making a face like if it was up to him he'd be sticking around longer.

Ryan was definitely the luckiest guy around, and if Boone kept looking at him like that they weren't even going to make it through dinner.

"Ah," Ryan said, and then decided that if Boone could take the leap and put himself out there then so could he. "You know, we can probably get this to go. If you want."

"Oh fuck yeah," Boone said, making eye contact with their waiter and pulling cash out of his wallet for the tip. "Can't leave town without finding out if it's true what they say about Bigfoot, anyway."

Ryan raised an eyebrow and figured he'd let Boone dig himself into whatever trouble he was gunning for. "And what's that?"

Boone smirked, and Ryan realized the exact trap he'd walked into as he opened his mouth, groaning before Boone could even get all of the words out. "He wears really big shoes."

-the end-

**Author's Note:**

> End note: This owes an obvious debt of inspiration to both Buzzfeed’s Unsolved and BA’s It’s Alive!; the ~vibe in both cases was too fun to resist making use of in this AU. Originally I planned a sequel where Seth becomes an equal part of this relationship, so consider that to be a possible future for all of them, if you like. 
> 
> Bonus note: I am compelled to share the fact that the X-Files episode Jersey Devil literally refers to the cryptid as “kind of like an East Coast Bigfoot”. Thanks for the serendipity, Chris Carter et al.


End file.
